Antoine's Adventure
by Velvet D'Coolette
Summary: Based on Season 1 of SatAM. Antoine has been in love with Sally for some time but the affection is never reciprocated. One night he takes a deadly risk to win her, only to be rescued by his rival Sonic. In the wake of this narrowly-avoided disaster Antoine seeks therapeutic help. This story follows his discoveries and healing with a counsellor. Psychological adventure.
1. Prologue pt 1

_A/N: This story takes place over the course of SatAM Season 1, including the pilot episode. It includes depictions of official parts of the show as well as events I've made up in-between._

_I have assumed that_ Hooked on Sonics _(the episode where Antoine single-handedly tries to capture Robotnik) took place right at the very beginning of this story, before the pilot episode. This is because that episode was absolutely perfect for starting this story. Otherwise please assume that the order of the SatAM episodes is intact, although if you don't know what the order is, it doesn't matter._

_I have also ignored the fact that in Season 2 Antoine seems to become very emotionally unstable. I have not written Antoine's character development in this story with that emotional instability in mind as the final product. Rather, it is a story in which Antoine meets and fights his own personal demons._

Prologue Part 1 Incorporating _Hooked on Sonics,_ written by Randy Rogel

Five Mobians crouched on a wooden platform cantilevered to the side of a tall tree. The Mobians were there because it was a good place to watch the battle between Sonic and the bird-legged machine while also being high enough to keep them hidden from the machine's sight, and it is fair to say that all of the Mobians wanted these two conditions. But there were also differences between the hiding Mobians' wishes. Curiously, despite the fact that they were all there for the same reason and witnessing the same event, internally something quite unique was happening for each of them.

Sally Acorn was intensely invested in the outcome of this battle for a variety of reasons. That is to say, she both wanted the machine to lose (because it was destroying her home and endangering people for whom she felt very responsible as their princess apparent) and she wanted Sonic to win (because not only was he her friend and comrade, but she had what many Mobians might call 'feelings' for him, although those same Mobians, when pressed, might become less certain of precisely what they meant by this). She also had an investment in Sonic's victory because she had very private, and very serious doubts that she could hope to win the war against Robotnik without a huge amount of support from Sonic.

Tails' investment in this battle had many key similarities to Sally's, except that he didn't feel responsible for the welfare of the village. Generally he felt very upbeat about Sonic's battles against Robotnik. His reasons for feeling this way were best known by himself but it may be tentatively suggested that Sonic's string of victories against the dictator represented a political freedom Tails had never known but desired, or perhaps that Sonic represented a father, big brother or other leadership figure Tails had also never known, and therefore idealised. The fox cub only tended to feel like one of the helpless villagers at times of relatively strong fear. His fear levels fluctuated during this particular battle so that sometimes he felt helpless and sometimes he felt excited about Sonic's victory.

Rotor's wish, also, was that Sonic would win. Interestingly, although he was of similar age to Sonic, he too drew a strong sense of parental security from Sonic's presence, perhaps beyond an age-appropriate degree. He was very open and spontaneous in his showing of this sentiment.

Bunnie Rabbot's feelings were similar enough that we need not go into them here, and we can most likely accurately guess that if she had her own thoughts to add then she would, if she'd had knowledge of this prologue.

Antoine D'Coolette watched Sonic fight the bird-legged machine with as much suspense as his companions. It is curious to note, however, that his feelings were by far the most negative. He disliked Sonic's flamboyant show of derision for the machine, and disliked even more Princess Sally's appreciation of this flamboyance. It is not that Antoine was a villain. Far from it. He was, in fact, far too frightened by events to be villainous, both in an immediate and an ongoing sense. But still, he tried to regain a sense of strength in the situation by judging, and therefore would have admitted to feeling hostile towards Sonic.

It is strange that he would feel and behave like this because surely, nothing worse could happen to Antoine in this scenario than Sonic's death and Robotnik's resulting unrestricted destruction of the Great Forest and it's inhabitants - including Antoine's amour, Sally. Sonic was much more useful to him alive than dead, and yet his behaviour at least partly suggested otherwise. It is the fact that Antoine felt and thought this way that prompted this story.

xXx

A fan of Sonic SatAM may already be aware that Sonic won his battle against the bird-legged robot, and that Knothole village as a whole decided celebrations were in order. It should be noted that Knothole celebrations almost invariably involved Sonic himself telling the story of his own recent victory, even if the villagers had witnessed the affair.

Antoine didn't want to hear Sonic's relating of his victory. However he turned up anyway, so his motivations may have been more complex than first appears. The coyote scowled, sometimes raised a skeptical eyebrow and made the occasional comment to himself and anybody who might perchance overhear him (although notably he was never direct enough to attract another villager's attention before speaking, except for one occasion when he asked some nondescript transient what Sonic had that he didn't, and even then he didn't wait for an answer). Usually he would show exasperation about what he considered to be Sonic's attention-seeking behaviour and sometimes questioned his intelligence. It was, in fact, difficult to determine whether he was part of the celebrating group or not.

And then came the event that precipitated the whole of the rest of this story: Sonic and Sally kissed.

Antoine's reaction to this might have been described as typical, but on the inside something more extreme happened for the coyote. For Antoine it was a kind of landmark event - one that brought home to him a lot of truths, not all of which he would be able to identify, at least not with the knowledge and resources available to him at that time. But we can learn which element felt most important to Antoine if we listen to a conversation he had with Rotor later that evening when Antoine came to relieve the walrus' ring pool watch duty.

"What's up Antoine?" Rotor asked. It would be interesting to know whether he understood he'd been manipulated into asking this question. Antoine's demeanour strongly suggested he wanted to be by himself, and yet he'd decided to allow this to show at a time he _had_ to be seen by his talkative friend Rotor. This was a somewhat passive-aggressive act and it might be guessed that Antoine wanted Rotor to reach out to him with concern, which all sentient beings very reasonably want and need from time to time. Whatever the level of his awareness of the situation, this is precisely what the walrus did.

Antoine answered. "Nothing is up. It is what is down here (he pointed to his heart) that is so terrible." Which, it is fair to say, did not really answer the question.

So Rotor pushed for an answer. "Like what?"

"Like the love of my life is crazy for a fool." Antoine had almost certainly never referenced his love for Sally before, especially not to a third party, so saying this this may have been a significant event in itself.

"A fuel?" Rotor asked, misinterpreting Antoine's accent, and also taking an opportunity to divert from the real conversation.

At this point a pattern began to develop, one with which Antoine may well have been familiar. His mispronunciation of the word 'fool' meant that instead of getting the sympathy an observer may have guessed he wanted, Antoine instead took a tangent with Rotor about the English language. Again, the fact that Rotor colluded with this is intriguing and raises the prospect that Rotor either wasn't very insightful or didn't want to have the conversation Antoine apparently intended to have and was trying to distract the coyote's attention away from it.

"Yes, a fool, a _fool!_ Why is this word so difficult to understand?" Antoine's habitual pattern came to fruition as he took an opportunity to get angry with someone - on this occasion, Rotor. A reader might wonder what response an angry Antoine might have wanted and whether Rotor's look of curious bafflement was it. Certainly it didn't prompt fear, an apology or a change in behaviour to something more desired, which is what most people want when they feel angry. "A fool is a stupid person."

"Oh, you mean a _fool!_"

"That is what I said: a fool." And with that, the conversation resumed, still with little suggestion from Antoine that talking directly about the problem may solve it. "Ah, the princess. She is not even noticing I am alive."

"Well, Sonic is a tough act to follow. You'll have to do something major to get Sally's attention."

"For instance like what?"

"Well, I don't know. Capture Robotnik and bring him back to Knothole! That'd do it." Rotor's laugh was his way of indicating that he was joking, but as any SatAM fan knows, his suggestion wasn't taken as such. "Well, see ya, Antoine."

And with that, Rotor left Antoine to his thoughts - and his watch duty.

xXx

To call Robotnik 'insane' may or may not have been accurate. It is true that much of what he did with regards destroying the hedgehog was not sensible and that his frustration over The Freedom Fighters' repeated victories tended to be more extreme than might be deemed healthy. But to label any sentient being as insane is to make a judgement and perhaps, to commit oneself to a viewpoint that may later turn out to be wrong.

There is always a grain of truth at the centre of any so-called madness and perhaps it would be more useful to look for that.

We may be puzzled, for instance, by the way he bullied, beat and bloodied Snively over failures in Robotnik's own hedgehog-destroying schemes. But to Julian himself, this direction of blame made sense. And he continued to use his nephew in his plans despite Snively's track record.

A viewer may puzzle over why Snively stayed for this unwarranted punishment, but that is a story all of its own.

So to return to the current point: Robotnik was furious and held Snively responsible. "The hedgehog did what?! You have failed me for the last time."

Snively quaked in his boots. Sometimes Robotnik found this satisfying, sometimes it wasn't enough... "We tried to stop him sir, but he destroyed the Shredder and..."

The dictator rarely accepted explanations from Snively. Either they got in the way of his need to blame or they were flawed - in which case, he went as close as he ever did to accepting, which was to acknowledge by threatening Snively until the conversation ended (usually with Snively losing his power of speech) or by moving on with the plan or initiating a new one. Something like this, in fact:

"How can a puny hedgehog destroy a two hundred and fifty ton machine?!"

"Well, sir, he made it reverse direction and..."

"Shut up! I want that shredder rebuilt. The Great Forest must be destroyed, and every ounce of life force energy sucked out of it! Do you understand?"

Snively, of course, had no liberty to say anything other than yes. And to watch his dictator the way a mouse watches a cat, too paralysed by fear to do anything other than look out for its own survival.

xXx

It is interesting to note that while waiting for the power ring that would be part of his plan, Antoine allowed himself to fall asleep. It is more interesting still to realise that he didn't quite sleep, but he _almost_ slept. As a result he only noticed a ring lift out of the pool just as it began to fall back in, and he _almost_ lost it, succeeding in retrieving it only by using a stick.

All of this is interesting because Antoine had more than one solution available to him to stay wide awake at this time but chose not to take any of them: no standing and pacing around, no splashing his face with cold pool water. As a freedom fighter who necessarily depended on his own conscientiousness to be a safely functioning individual and who was engaged in a plan to gain something he very much wanted, this was an odd set of choices.

In light of this, his not-quite-but-almost failure to achieve several goals was all the more interesting. An observer might suspect Antoine liked to risk failure.

Nevertheless, there is a story to be told and much more time later to dwell on these mysteries. No sooner had Antoine grabbed the power ring than he set out alone for Robotropolis, perhaps assuming that Rotor knew he was there and that that would serve for back-up.

He turned out to be wrong. Almost, in any case.

xXx

Robotropolis was full of dangers - like SWATbots - and things that could precipitate danger - such as surveillance bots to alert Robotnik of intruders, lengths of piping to trip noisily over and much more besides.

Antoine successfully negotiated these - only just, as as we are beginning to discover was his usual pattern. The existence of robotic rats in the city, as careless as Antoine was clumsy, unwittingly saved him from discovery.

A surveillance bot flew by and he saw that he had his chance. For a few moments he stood quaking in front of it, unable to move for fear. Then he reached into the pack on his back and pulled out the ring. He showed it to the camera. "R-r-robotnik, I have a power ring! If you want the ring, please to meet me at the city limits in one hour."

The camera was able to transmit sound in both directions so the coyote heard Robotnik and Snively's conversation about sending SWATbots. And this was where Antoine found a little more courage.

"Ah-ah, no SWATbots. You must come alone."

Whether what happened next was a true accident or not is left up to the reader's judgement, but perhaps it is significant to note that, having insisted on his own terms with Robotnik himself, Antoine made another blunder. He dropped the ring and it fell almost out of reach, leaving him very vulnerable with his eyes down and, it is fair to say, rather humiliated in front of the admittedly debonair dictator.

True to form, Antoine survived this encounter without meeting Robotnik's robot soldiers by something most people would call luck.

xXx

Sonic could easily and almost accurately be said to be happy as he went to take over Antoine's duty at the ring pool. Easily, because most of Sonic's emotions were some variation of joy. Almost accurately, because that joy had a few twists and contaminations to it that meant his happiness was not always pure. Whether Sonic's gleeful taunting of Antoine came from fear or anger or something else, only Sonic might have been able to say, but it is reasonable to suggest that if he'd been feeling entirely happy about Antoine's existence he would not say what he said:

"Yo, Ant! It's my watch! You can go get your ugly sleep! Ha ha! Too cool, too cool."

See?

Perhaps he was also pleased because his watch wouldn't be the important one of the night. He knew that the night's ring would already have been retrieved so all he had to do was take it from Antoine and guard it and the site for the rest of the night.

"Where ya at, Ant? Under a rock, sheddin' your skin?"

He expected to see Antoine sleeping. It was rare for Antoine to sulk so Sonic began to feel concerned about the coyote's lack of response. If Antoine wasn't here, where was the ring?

When he found the stick, he knew something bad had happened.

xXx

Who knows whether an hour was the right length of time for Antoine to tell Julian? But he ended up huddling against the cold and wind as he waited. When Robotnik's hovercraft appeared he went to meet it.

"Do you have it?"

"B-b-but of c-c-course."

It seems only reasonable that Robotnik found this whole situation odd. "Tell me, why do you betray your friends?" he asked as he approached.

Antoine held up the ring. "T-take this and you will understand."

Robotnik grinned at the wickedness of it all. Such power in the ring such as could divide friends. Now _that_ was power! He stepped forward; what was going on in his psychological process regarding the risk of accepting the coyote's invitation we will never know. Perhaps he expected a booby trap. Either way, he fell into one. "Aargh! You little fool."

Antoine felt his confidence increase, and it is fair to suggest he felt satisfied with this outcome. "I am not a fool. You are the fool."

Robotnik's calm question should probably have raised alarm bells. "And what will you do with me?" But Antoine had already demonstrated a dangerous problem with acuity regarding his own safety.

He strutted back and forth as he answered. "I bring you to the freedom fighters, where you will stand the trial for your terrible crimes. I will be a large hero, and win the hand of the princess."

"A nice dream," conceded a dictator who already knew he had won this battle. "But dreams are meant to be broken."

Antoine, it appeared, hadn't considered the possibility of Robotnik having jet boots. Or laser guns built into his fingertips.

"Now give me the power ring, you pathetic little rodent."

The switch-up was as swift as it was dramatic, leaving Antoine as shocked as he'd ever been in his life.

xXx

Sonic may have had his own set of character flaws but keeping emergencies to himself wasn't one of them. Before long he'd called the other Freedom Fighters for a talk.

"Antoine's history. I've looked everywhere," he said, having checked the whole village.

"Are you sure?" asked Sally, more as an alternative to 'Oh dear, that's bad news' than to cast doubt on Sonic's thoroughness.

"Yep," he answered anyway because his intuitive sense told him it hadn't been a question about his conscientiousness at all. "I found this stick at the grotto. Looks like he used it to fish out a power ring."

Before anybody else had time to wonder over what Antoine would do with a power ring Rotor had a pang of guilt, which in true personal style he was honest about. "Uh oh. I think he might have gone after Robotnik." In fact, he felt ashamed enough of his part in Antoine's decision that he protected himself by turning away.

Sonic didn't buy this at first and flat-out denied it, thereby adding weight to the idea he was a little more of a parent figure to Rotor than was ideal. "No way. That's too stupid a move. Even for Antoine."

Rotor explained anyway. "Well, he wanted to impress Sally, and I said that if he captured Robotnik, well, that would impress her."

Sally, whose mind was already racing, found herself thinking about the implications of this. The idea of teenagers taking unnecessary risks to impress each other was a potentially dangerous dynamic in the all-teen Freedom Fighters. But before she went too far down the track of thinking about that she pulled herself back to the present. She would most certainly think about how to manage this problem later, though. And come up with solutions. Perhaps too many and too thorough, but that was Sally.

"I was only jokin'." Of course, Rotor hadn't wanted this to happen and the threat to Antoine and everyone else was enough to make him feel very much like a small child.

Sally gasped. "Sonic, he could be in danger!"

"So?" retorted Sonic. He knew that he'd end up going after Antoine either way so had a brief argument with Sally over it. It felt good to have a dig at the coyote, who he'd sensed as a rival in Sally's affection. For let's not forget that Sonic still had an intuitive sense even if it didn't get shown very often. In fact, his intuition had saved his life too many times to count.

Sally took the bait, because too much of her attention was on her responsibility to Antoine to care about avoiding being duped. "So?! He would come after you, if you were in trouble!"

Sonic didn't need words to answer.

"Okay, maybe not. But if Robotnik gets that power ring..."

Perhaps Sonic saw the logic here that would make him go after the coyote. But he'd already placed a stake on not going after his bitter rival and argued using the first words to come to mind. "Nah, it can't do him any good. The power doesn't last long and no one can use it 'cept me."

"Yes, but you know Robotnik. He could uncover its secret. Right?"

Sonic never liked to be defeated, but all credit to him, he took this one on the chin. "Yeah, you're right, Sal."

Bunnie had a practical point of her own to make. "But there won't be another ring for twenty four hours."

"Then I'll have to take on Robuttnik without one."

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	2. Prologue pt 2

Prologue part 2 Incorporating _Hooked on Sonics,_ written by Randy Rogel

Quite apart from Antoine's lack of desire to be in Robotnik's custody, the fact that he was now restrained even from moving was unpleasant for him. This was partly because he wasn't physically being stopped, but stayed where he was by virtue of a threat. A SWATbot stood to either side of him and he had made a decision that running away would be a bad idea. It was an unusually passive situation for this habitually angry Mobian.

But then, what are we to make of the fact that he was there at all?

Robotnik, as was his usual habit, described to Antoine his plan for what to do with the power ring. Possessing one was something he'd fantasised about on many occasions and had already prepared for, having built a machine he'd hypothesised would be able to harness its power.

"Now we'll see if this power ring will live up to its name. This radar tracks all moving objects. But the Sonic radar tracks only one kind: those travelling at supersonic speed."

Antoine really, _really_ didn't want to be in this situation and now that events were spiralling way out of his control, he felt as guilty as he felt terrified.

Sonic showed up on the radar. So Robotnik set his machine to shoot at him.

A thoroughly emasculated Antoine groaned with the fear that his only hope of being rescued had just been murdered.

Meanwhile, outdoors and several miles away a rather shocked Sonic pulled himself unsteadily to his feet. No laser had ever shot at him before and its attack had been a genuine surprise - in contrast to him being aware _outside of awareness_ that it would happen, thereby merely having the appearance of surprise - like Antoine's capture. "Oh man, what was that?" he asked out loud, despite nobody being there. Of course, he received no answer and had known he wouldn't, which made his motivations for talking to himself curious.

Understandably given his very limited resources of information, he decided to sprint on.

Which Robotnik noticed via his radar. "So, the hedgehog wants to play?" He shot again.

The second bolt hit Sonic hard and sent him physically bouncing back across the hard-baked ground. After picking himself up again he said, "How's that metalhead trackin' me? Time to crank it up."

Perhaps we can all be forgiven for trying the same tactic more than once, especially when we've just been mildly concussed. And when we're heavily invested in a specific course of action working. Of course, you can guess what happened next.

Boom.

Sonic noticed the pattern and guessed a little more about why the attacks were happening. "Man, I don't get it. He knows exactly when I'm juicin'." Perhaps it was Sonic's habit of talking to himself that let him work his way through the difficult thought process he had to go through at this point. "I can't use my speed." It was a bitter pill for him, but he took it.

All of which left Antoine in a terrible position. Whether he recognised that Sonic was probably still alive (the multiple shots fired indicated that the first hadn't killed the hedgehog, so what was to say the last one had?) or whether that didn't matter one jot to him by this point, only he knew. But at that point, his fear spiked as Robotnik decided to have him sent to be roboticized.

xXx

Well, finally Sonic got to the city. In fact, he was just in time to watch the bird-legged machine being carried away, back to the Great Forest. It'd been fixed.

But he had other things to worry about, the most immediate of which was an opening door. He hid, only to hear the footsteps of SWATbots and Antoine's familiar accented voice. "Ah, pardon. I-I-I would like the very much to be apologising for any convenience I have caused you."

Which, it is needless to say, was not heard. Literally, perhaps it was, but it certainly wasn't empathised with or extrapolated from by the robots. They carried him into a hovercraft.

Sonic, often a quick thinker, thought to hitch a very discrete ride on the hovercraft, which took him with Antoine but away from the shredding machine.

When they disembarked Antoine was still trying to soften the SWATbots with a string of apologies as they took him into the roboticizing chamber, and displaying a remarkable level of either optimism or desperation. "Anyway, I am so sorry for distributing your busy schedule, and I promise it will never be to happen again. I also would like to be apologising for..."

Antoine found himself very promptly underneath the glass tube of the machine. It was then that he saw Sonic through the soundproof glass. It didn't take long for Sonic to clear the area and free the coyote.

Antoine may have been very relieved but as we have already learned, he liked more potent emotions than that, preferably heading in the direction of anger. He grabbed Sonic by the shoulders. "Sonic! Robotnik is going to be destroying the Great Forest with his terrible Shredder machine!"

Perhaps it is lucky that Sonic didn't take this as bad manners. "Yeah, I saw it! We gotta juice!"

We may never know precisely why Antoine had a flush of modesty at this point, but he did. "I am thinking he is using the power ring to run it! I.. I'm sorry."

And the honesty brought honesty in return. Honesty does that. "It's cool Ant. We'll stop him." But then something else came to mind for the hedgehog. "Wait a sec. Does he have some new machine that knows when I'm juicin'?"

"Oui, Oui. You must not be running or he will fire on you."

Perhaps Sonic had a plan to thwart the radar, perhaps he simply wanted to try his speed again in the hope that it would work. "No choice Ant. Get a grip! Juice time!"

xXx

Robotnik had always known that the Freedom Fighters lived somewhere in the Great Forest. So it is once again puzzling that he hadn't destroyed it before. Either way, the bird-legged machine was ready to work again and this time, Julian was present to watch the destruction.

Sonic approached the area at a sprint, visible on Robotnik's laser-radar. Neither had expected Sonic to be able to sprint. Julian, characteristically, was angry. "The hedgehog. How does he do this?!"

Sonic was, of course, aware of the danger the laser represented, and he'd come up with a plan. His plan suited his flamboyant personality perfectly: stand on the front grille of the bird-legged machine's head and run away as soon as he was shot at.

Sonic's swift destruction of the shredder for a second time sent Robotnik almost into a rage. But it seemed he wasn't ready to desert himself to fury quite yet...

Sonic had already spotted the most likely location of his power ring: right at the centre of a cluster of SWATbots, inside a machine which they were guarding. Heavily and conspicuously guarded, in other words. He ran into the cluster perhaps without thinking and out of juice right beside the machine. And face to face with Julian.

"I do not give up easily, hedgehog. Look around you." Sonic did. Robotnik was right: he and Antoine were indeed surrounded. They both backed towards the machine - the only protection available to them - as the SWATbots and their master advanced.

"This is a stupid question, but... Have any ideas, Ant?"

Robotnik spoke, something to do with ways of killing Sonic. But the hedgehog was too stressed and busy thinking to hear what he said. Perhaps he wasn't sure where his talent for quick thinking had gone.

But then Antoine called for his attention. "Sonic," he whispered excitedly and showed him what he'd found. "Look!" It was the ring!

Sonic was relieved for sure. "All right, Ant! Let's juice!" And he sprinted to safety with the coyote in tow.

But not before taunting the SWATbots first. With the ring's power at his disposal, their reactions were too slow to shoot him. Before leaving he paused in front of the radar and invited a very angry Robotnik to shoot at him.

Robotnik shot without thinking, and the machine was destroyed. And so Julian got his payoff of being angry and Sonic left the scene feeling superior.

xXx

As might be expected, the celebration that came next was Sonic-centered. But this time Antoine was there too. The coyote felt euphoric and wanted so much to make the most of this opportunity to be revered. And, with danger out of the way, he didn't want Sonic to hog the limelight, so to speak. So when Sonic began to talk he interrupted.

"It was terrible! There I was, Robotnik on the one side of my side, ten thousands of SWATbots on the other."

Tails was very impressed, which perhaps shows just how much the fox cub idealised the role of hero. Perhaps he simply _wanted_ to be impressed and didn't much care about the content of Antoine's words. "Wow! Ten thousand?!"

Whatever the reason, it is fair to say that Tails was the only listener not offended by Antoine's exaggeration.

"I had nowhere else to go, ah, and had only my very naked hands as weapons. They are a scared of me, so I told them: You shall ever never take me alive! I knew I would have to fight them one at a time, and there I was alone, shaking, but only because it was cold. Apart from that, it was beautiful..."

xXx

However, after telling his story and after Tails had left him, Antoine began to feel depressed. This wasn't the effect he'd wanted to achieve, and in all honesty he didn't know how to react to it. At least when he'd felt depressed before it was because he'd wanted to win Princess Sally's hand. He'd had a goal to achieve. Now he didn't feel he had anything to aim for and it left him feeling crestfallen and restless both at once. He tried going home until dusk, when the time came for him to relieve Sonic's ring pool duty. Being at home didn't make him feel any better, but it didn't make him feel any worse, either.

The time came for him to take over from Sonic so he walked down to the pool. He didn't want to be seen as miserable in front of the hedgehog so he kept his head high and proud.

"Glad you could make it, Ant!" Sonic said with the familiar note of mocking sarcasm.

Antoine eyed the hedgehog with suspicion. "Of course I was to be making it." He waited for Sonic to stand up so he could sit on the stump, but instead Sonic blocked his way to the seat, grinning at the coyote.

Finally he said, "So. Was she impressed?" with more of that sarcasm.

Antoine opened his mouth to answer but couldn't think of anything to say. And that made Sonic grin even more widely.

Eventually the hedgehog burst out laughing. "Man, you need so much therapy! G'bye Ant!" he chuckled and sped off.

Antoine sighed and sat down.

xXx

The following three hours passed slowly by. Three hours, when one is alone in the cold and dark, is not a stimulating experience. So perhaps it is unsurprising that Antoine found himself thinking. Feelings mainly, with relatively few actual thoughts.

He thought about how Sally hadn't waited to hear his whole story, and felt the feelings that the realisation prompted. He was extremely surprised to discover that he couldn't remember when she'd left.

He thought about Tails' slavish fascination with his story - which the coyote had shamelessly embellished. He wanted to feel proud again but wasn't really able to. He didn't know why he'd exaggerated so much, and wondered whether Tails would have been impressed if he hadn't. This line of thought ended quite messily, somehow turning into a rather odd mash of feelings instead. Guilt was in there somewhere.

He thought about Rotor's excellent and audacious plan, which had gone badly wrong. Now that Antoine had the benefit of hindsight, he realised it wasn't a good plan at all.

He thought about how the next watch was Rotor's and that he'd give the walrus a piece of his mind when he came to take over. It had all been Rotor's fault! The danger of Robotnik having a power ring, his almost-roboticization, Antoine's failure to complete his plan. In Antoine's opinion it was all a terrible mess! _Somebody should pay,_ he decided.

He simmered. Which felt better than depression, which felt far too much like a void for him to feel for long.

_Somebody_ had to pay.

"Hey Antoine," came Rotor's voice behind him.

Antoine turned to watch the fat fool waddle in his direction.

Rotor stopped in his tracks and looked nonplussed. "Uh... what?"

"You!" Antoine snapped. "You made it happen!"

Rotor didn't look scared by Antoine's wrath. Instead he scratched his head and walked closer. "What are you talking about, Antoine?"

The coyote stood up, his fists balled and his shoulders tight. "You made me take the ring to Robotropolis."

Rotor may have looked shamed for a moment but then the expression disappeared. "Look, Antoine. I made a joke and I'm sorry. But you're the one who took it seriously."

Antoine didn't want to hear it. "It was your fault!"

The walrus didn't look angry at this (which for some reason Antoine didn't find very satisfying at all). Instead he gave Antoine a look, like a teacher trying to politely explain something to a rather stupid pupil. "It was a joke, Antoine. If you didn't see that then I'm sorry, but... It was a joke."

By this time Antoine wasn't really listening any more. If he'd had a cooler head at this point he might have noticed that he'd become stuck at the 'you betrayed me' stage of the conversation. But he didn't. So he spluttered, "You lied!" without the awareness to get what he wanted in the discussion (which only he could have best identified, but may well have involved Rotor taking the blame).

Rotor looked at Antoine as if he _was_ stupid then. He approached the tree stump that served as a seat, and took one final look at the coyote. "Antoine, if you're going to take everything I say seriously, then why don't you go and get yourself some help?"

Antoine saw this as a confrontation and called Rotor on it. "Help? Pah! What is this help?" He glared at the walrus and folded his arms.

But Rotor wanted to give up on the conversation by this point. He rolled his eyes and looked out over the pool. "Go and see a shrink or something. Goodnight, Antoine."

xXx

Outside of his awareness Antoine decided not to recognise that Sonic and Rotor's words were only a coincidence.

As luck would have had it, he'd heard the word 'shrink' before, so he knew it didn't only pertain to making something smaller. It also, he knew, meant 'therapist' or 'counsellor'.

At first he tried to disapprove of the idea, to fold his arms and frown at the ring pool. But the ring pool didn't take any steps to make things better, so that didn't help.

He wondered: was his behaviour really that bad that two people thought he needed help? Understandably he didn't want it to be true. But something about the suggestion bothered him. In fact, it bothered him more so than his routine animosity with Sonic. Like, if two of his friends actually _said_ he needed a therapist, what did the others think? What did Sally think?

During the following few days he tried to forget the episode but Sonic and Rotor's words haunted him. _Go and see a therapist._

By the end of the week he was still thinking about all of this. It was like a flea in his ear, and what made it worse was that Sonic had said so. Sonic the fool.

And that was what made Antoine feel brave enough to look at a local noticeboard for a therapist. _Just one session,_ he decided. If he attended one session he would know for sure that Sonic was wrong, that Antoine didn't need that kind of help, and he would be able to get on with his life.

The noticeboard served the surrounding villages, and Antoine found the contact details of a counsellor who lived a discrete distance away. Near the sea, in fact.

After a polite letter written and sent by both himself and the therapist (named Seahorse Morgan) Antoine decided to attend his session. A consultation, the seahorse called it, to assess his suitability for counselling. It sounded perfect.

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	3. Antoine Agrees on a Soft Contract

Antoine Agrees on a Soft Contract

Antoine didn't know what to expect, so it was with a churning in his stomach that he sat in one of the two chairs and waited for the counsellor to come. He linked his fingers and looked around the room and wondered whether he was making a mistake. The room was warm and comfortable but very plain, with no family photographs or personal objects or art. A clock, fixed on the wall, ticked quietly and once he noticed it he couldn't ignore it.

The door opened and he flinched. A seahorse smiled at him through the crack. "Good morning Antoine," she said in a gentle, nasal voice, and came in. She sat down opposite him and settled her angular body into the cushions with a small wiggle of her shoulders. "Now, as I described in my letter, our consultation is fifty minutes long, so as soon as you'd like to tell me what you want counselling for, feel free to begin."

Antoine, after reading her letter, had realised he would need to plan for this question and he'd decided to talk about his unrequited love. He knew the story - and the tragedy - of his life so he confidently began the explanation. "Well Madame, it is being like this. I am in love with the princess Sally but she, ah..." (this part always hurt him) "...she does not to be seeing my love. Instead she is loving Sonic the hedgehog."

He paused so that the seahorse could answer, his dislike for Sonic hanging between them like a bad smell. He looked forward to hearing her answer - perhaps this professional could give him some ideas about how to gain Sally's attention. She nodded and re-settled her webbed hands in her lap, but she didn't say anything. The silence stretched on and he began to wonder what was happening.

She continued to say nothing.

Finally he cleared his throat. "And that is the problem," he repeated. "I love her and she does not to be loving me."

The seahorse nodded. "You are in love with her. So, what is it you would like from these sessions?"

Antoine had thought it was obvious. A solution, that was what he wanted! He huffed his irritation at the counsellor's lack of intelligence and with his brow creasing with annoyance said, "What I am wanting is..."

He went quiet. What _did_ he want? For Sally to see Sonic's foolishness and to fall in love with Antoine instead. But now that somebody was sitting opposite him with their attention absolutely on him and quietly waiting for a response, he felt foolish putting his wish into those exact words.

The pause went on for long enough that the seahorse noticed. "You look like you're feeling something," she said.

Antoine shook out of his thoughts for a moment and focussed on her. Well, obviously he was feeling, he was suffering from unrequited love! "It is sad that she does not love me back," he explained flatly and watched her irritably for signs of understanding.

"May I make a suggestion?" the counsellor asked.

Antoine paused with surprise, and nodded.

"Try answering the question from an irrational place." When Antoine looked confused (he didn't know what all of her words meant and in this case wasn't able even to take a calculated guess) she said, "In your wildest dreams, what would happen?"

That was easy. "She would be forgetting him and loving me."

The seahorse nodded. "How possible do you think that really is?"

Antoine felt annoyed. "But you are just to be asking about my wildest of dreams! How am I supposed to be knowing if it is the possible!" He scowled and folded his arms. "I do not understanding why you have asked."

He expected her to turn haughty then, or get angry or (he hoped) look sorry and apologise. But she did none of these things. Instead she said in a matter-of-fact way, "I asked because some of the things people most want are not possible. But they don't always let the impossibility stop them from wanting it. They forget, and carry on wanting it anyway. My intention was to check with you what you most want so that we could start from there. If what you want isn't actually possible then perhaps we should plan for something that _is,_ instead."

Antoine grudgingly accepted that there was a kind of logic to this but he scowled anyway. "Hmph. We are wasting the time. You should only to be asking what is possible."

"So, what is the nearest possible wish to the one you expressed?" she asked.

By now Antoine felt like he barely wanted to be there any more. And Sonic and Rotor had thought _this_ was going to make anything better? Better to solve the problem on his own than waste time with this so-called professional. His arms still folded, he said, "For her to falling in love with me. That is not impossible, is it?" he glared at her and dared her to deny it.

The seahorse tilted her head. "No, it isn't. How do you propose we make Sally fall in love with you?"

Antoine stopped short. Almost before he knew what to say he said, "That is not what I meant. I only meant for you to tell me how to woo her so that she will..." He fell quiet as he saw his argument turn full-circle.

The counsellor seemed to have been watching Antoine go through his thoughts and said, "I asked because your question seems to centre around changing another person's - Sally's - behaviour. But since she isn't the person sitting in front of me I'm not able to do that. I can only help _you_ influence _your_ behaviour, Antoine."

Antoine blinked at her, astounded and with a familiar wounded feeling in his chest. "Oh." But he'd already tried everything with Sally. Acts of courage, poetry, flowers...

"So with that in mind, I would like to suggest we agree on a course of counselling that involves only you."

Perhaps there was something she could suggest. Something he simply hadn't thought of. "Oui, I am happy to be doing this," he said a little more meekly than before.

"So, have you decided what you would like to do?"

Antoine didn't understand why the seahorse couldn't just tell him what he should do, but he felt so disoriented by now that he simply tried to answer. "I want..." How was he supposed to phrase this? He shut his eyes and concentrated hard on what he was saying. "...to understand why my behaviour is not attracting the princess and what I can do to change it so that it will. Or... might."

The seahorse nodded. "Okay."

They sat in silence for a moment as Antoine thought about all of this. Could there really be a way to finding a solution to the princess' lack of interest in him? Was it worth coming for more sessions to make that dream come true? There was something different about the way they interacted, something he'd never experienced before. She seemed... he wasn't sure. Relaxed? Gentle? He wasn't sure why that was relevant, but somehow it was.

He decided to go for it.

Now Antoine only had one other problem. He drew himself up to his full (though seated) height. "I will also be needing this to happen in three sessions or less. Your charge..." The truth was, he felt embarrassed admitting he couldn't easily afford this help. But if he took all of his savings, did a little extra work to raise more funds and insisted on three sessions at most, he could do it. In a month's time the princess would be in his arms!

The seahorse paused and dipped her long snout. "I understand. I strongly recommend more than three sessions but if you need, we can arrange a lower rate so that we can achieve your objective."

After a little more discussion they decided on ten sessions at a reduced price, and Antoine left, his head full of thoughts and worry and hope about what would happen in the coming weeks.

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	4. Antoine and the OK Corral

Antoine and the OK Corral Incorporating pilot episode _Heads or Tails_

The time of the first real counselling session came and Antoine arrived at the seaweed-draped hut to be greeted by the seahorse. Once he'd settled in the same seat as before, the counsellor spoke.

"So. How has your week been, Antoine?"

This was a very ordinary question. And on Antoine's paid time too! He frowned. "I would be liking us to start the counselling, please."

The seahorse thought for a moment and then said, "Perhaps I didn't phrase my question specifically enough. Let me ask again. How have your relationships been in this past week, since we last met?"

Antoine opened his mouth and then shut it again. "I do not to be understanding. With who? The princess?"

"That would be a good start."

Antoine wondered why she hadn't said so in the first place and wriggled in his seat. "Ah, I suppose it has been the same as always. She has been too distracted with plans and with Sonic."

Once the seahorse had established that 'plans' meant plans for fighting Robotnik, he continued. The past week had been as frustrating as ever.

"The princess and Rotor have been working with Bunnie to better understand the strength in her arms. Of course I wished to be helping so I offered Bunnie advice on her throwing. But she did not appreciate this. So instead I went to Sally and told her how beautiful she looks when she works. I am thinking this is when she looks prettiest."

"You appreciate her intelligence?" the counsellor said. Perhaps it was a question, perhaps not, Antoine wasn't quite sure but he answered anyway.

"Of course! And then she said that the only royalty is nature. She likes the nature very much so sometimes I am writing poetry about it for her. I was telling to her she was royalty to me but I think she did not accept this.

"She did not look happy for me to be there but she was happy soon after, when Sonic came." Antoine felt a flush of anger.

The counsellor tilted her head and blinked her strange eyes. "How do you feel about Sonic?" she asked.

"He is stupid!" he answered immediately and felt his fists clench. "He is a fool and he, he... He is making the idiot decisions! When he came he ran past me and made me be dizzy. I hate him when he does it. And then he came back to be teasing at me! I don't understand why Sally likes him. I really do not!" Now even his face was tense from the memory. He stewed in his anger for a moment and then continued. "My princess came to her senses and gave the hedgehog a telling off for not helping."

"How did you feel when she did that?"

Antoine relaxed slightly as he realised how attentively she was following his story. "Better. He tried to be charming his way out of this but my princess would not let him and soon she was to be making him help with her and Rotor's project. But when Sonic left to find the things she was needing she looked as if she liked him more because of his laziness. I do not understand it! Why does he do these things?"

He expected the counsellor to look outraged but if she was, she only showed it by stretching the tight curl out of her tail and then curling it again.

Eventually he continued. "You see, Sally is so able and she had a clever plan to fight back at Robotnik's chemical attack. They even found time to be flirting with each other when Sally told him about a problem with the striking range. And Sonic, he was making a plan where he could be showing off! He ran out to the buzz-bombers and taunted at them in front of everybody! And then when it was over, the princess told him he was great and they walked away together with him fishing for even more of her compliments."

And he settled back, his arms folded. "There. That is what happened. What can I do, she watches him and likes his ideas but she does not like me." The injustice of it was... Was...

The seahorse settled herself again in her chair as she considered his story. "It sounds to me as if you're angry with Sally as well as Sonic," she said thoughtfully.

Antoine looked at her, shocked. "Oh no, there is no possibility that I could be angry with the princess! She is perfect in the way she is. Everything about her is the perfect."

The counsellor tilted her head and said, "Except for not being in love with you."

"Ah, but that is not an imperfection. She is not responsible for..." He stopped as he thought about what he was saying. "Well, she is not." He couldn't hold her responsible for that, of course not. "It is Sonic, it is his fault!"

The counsellor seemed to be thinking again. Then she said, "Antoine, there is something I would like to show you." She stood up and walked to an A-board with several sheets of paper pinned to it. She took a piece of graphite and drew a large plus sign on it. At the top she wrote 'I'm OK' and at the bottom 'I'm not OK'. Then to the left 'You're not OK' and on the right, 'You're OK'. Then she stood back so that he could easily see it.

"Have you ever seen this before?"

He shook his head. "Non, Madame."

"This is a graph of our belief in our own value, and the value of others. For this graph, 'OK' means 'basically valuable, loveable and valid as a person.' A person might do things that we don't like, but our opinion of their basic value is - or can be - different. Our overall existential position is about our opinion of ourselves, and about others." She paused. "Can you tell me which one of these positions you feel about Sonic?"

Antoine felt very confused. After a few moments he hadn't been able to gather his thoughts enough to answer so the seahorse spoke again.

"May I suggest one?"

The coyote nodded carefully. "Oui..?"

She pointed to one quadrant of the cross. "I suggest you feel I'm OK, you're not OK about Sonic. You described his irresponsibility and mentioned your confusion over why Sally prefers him compared to you. Would you agree that you feel that he lacks basic value?"

Antoine was taken aback. "I- Well! I did not mean to be saying he is so bad, he is the good fighter against the SWATbots."

"That's an excellent point, but I wasn't asking for your rational appraisal of Sonic. You see," she continued as she sat down opposite him. "We make decisions about whether we value other people very early in our lives. In fact, it's just about the first decision we ever make. We don't decide whether others are valuable or not based on a set of facts, we do so intuitively." Antoine didn't recognise this final word but understood well enough when the seahorse patted the area over her heart.

"I did not know Sonic until I was perhaps four years of age," Antoine explained. "I do not think this can be right."

"I'm not suggesting you decided this specifically about Sonic," the counsellor said. "'You're not OK' is much more fundamental than that and is a decision you made about the Other person."

Antoine's head was starting to spin. Did she have to use so many unusual words? And anyway, she wasn't talking about Sally, who was the person Antoine really wanted to know about. He frowned. "I would like you to use better words, please." He hated admitting to not knowing words. It made him feel like he was being accused of being lazy and that wasn't true.

The seahorse paused. "I'm sorry Antoine, I am using quite a few jargon words, aren't I? How would you like us to manage those?"

He looked at her. He was beginning to realise just how much she treated him with respect. It was very different from his comrades' impatience, the quiet rollings of eyes he'd seen so many times and the irritable corrections. It felt strange but... good. Usually when somebody used a word he didn't recognise he tried to work out what it meant from the context, often got it wrong, resolved to find it in the dictionary later, and then simply forgot. Usually because he only knew the phonetic sound of the word rather than its spelling, which wasn't his fault either.

But now that he was having a rational conversation about it, what _did_ he want to do? "I would like to write down your words and their meanings." He'd thought of this a long time ago but somehow never did it. Well, he didn't like to be teased for it by Sonic, or he often heard new words on missions when he couldn't take the time to record them.

"Very well," she said.

Antoine pulled his poetry notebook out of his pocket. "This word, thunder-metal..."

"Fundamental. It means basic, underneath and supporting everything else. Like the concrete a building is built on."

Antoine scribbled and they continued.

"Now," the seahorse mused, "Where were we? Ah yes: the 'you're not OK' position. We make a fundamental decision soon after birth about the Other person. And Other can be anyone who isn't you yourself."

Antoine prodded his lip with the eraser end of his pencil. "So Other is Sonic as well as everybody else, including the princess?"

"Yes, that's right."

"But this cannot be correct. I feel the differently about Sonic and Princess Sally."

"You have more complex feelings about each of them because they represent different things to you. But what about your _fundamental_ belief about their OK-ness? Let's start with Sonic."

The counsellor's preoccupation with Sonic felt very unhelpful to Antoine. It was Sally he wanted to talk about, so he told her so. "Madame, I wish to be talking about the princess. I think we should be starting with her."

The seahorse nodded as she thought about this. Soon enough she said, "I suggest we avoid directly using Sally when we talk about this model because you have a lot of complex feelings about her including a desire to see her as perfect. I think that would interfere with your ability to learn what I am telling you."

"I do not wish to be using Sonic. I feel-" he folded his arms and shrugged. "-bad, about him."

"Who would you rather choose?"

Antoine thought. "I think I will be choosing Rotor."

The seahorse nodded. "Very well, Rotor it is. What do you currently feel about him?"

Resentful, was the answer. "He was suggesting to me that I should catch Robotnik to win the hand of the princess. But he said to me after I tried to catch him that this was to be a joke." He stopped and felt the rawness of this betrayal. "He let me down."

"Hmm..." The counsellor's nasal voice sounded sympathetic. After a few seconds of silence that felt to Antoine as if she'd been sadly considering his disappointment in Rotor - but not accusing him in any way of causing it - she said, "Can you choose another person?"

The coyote thought. For some reason he felt unwilling to suggest Bunnie or Tails. "Snively?"

"Okay, and how do you feel about him?"

"Well - ah, bad. He is a danger. And a coward," Antoine added. Then he looked at the graph. "These other three. What do they mean?"

The seahorse pointed to the one diagonally opposite I'm OK you're not-OK. "This one is I'm not-OK you're OK. It's a position of feeling one-down compared to other people. If you're here then you feel like you're not as good as Other."

Antoine thought. It spoke to him, that position, but he wasn't sure why. "I think he feels that way about Robotnik."

The seahorse nodded. "That's very perceptive. It's very likely to be true, although you might know better than I do because you see them together sometimes and I only did once, during the coup."

"Why do you saying that this is likely to be? If I am correct and Snively does not feel as good as Robotnik then Snively would not want to be near him."

"It seems to make sense at first, doesn't it?" The seahorse said. "But think about this: what if I told you that I'm OK you're not-OKs tend to pair up with I'm not-OK you're OKs?" She pointed at each place on the graph so this didn't get too confusing for Antoine.

"But this is to the ridiculous. Why would they to be doing this? The I'm not OKs would not..." He thought about what he was saying. Surely they wouldn't _like_ being around somebody who reinforced their belief they were not OK? "I mean... Why does the I'm not-OK you're OK exist in the first of places?"

"There are advantages to all of the positions," said the counsellor. "For I'm not-OK you're OK, the benefit is that they believe they are incapable and they spend time around their opposites because they will confirm it for them. It's not pleasant, but if they already believe they are not valuable or loveable or capable, they already feel strained enough by the rigors of life and want the world to stay familiar so at least they know how to behave. And what to expect."

Antoine found that he felt a little embarrassed by this. He waited for her to keep talking but instead she went quiet and watched him.

"But what about Sonic and perhaps Tails?" he asked, his words coming quickly. "Tails is young and he thinks Sonic is very good. I think he believes Sonic is You're OK. What about that, ah?"

The counsellor looked warmly at him. It wasn't quite a smile but it was genuine. "Well, I'd suggest that it is reasonable for Tails to accept Sonic's greater ability. It is only reasonable that an adult would be more capable than a child." Her speech was much slower and more relaxed than Antoine's.

"But this proves you cannot be right," the coyote kept talking, still surprisingly fast. "Because it is expected that Tails is less able. So there cannot be anything wrong with his believing it."

The seahorse nodded again. "So how do you think that compares against Snively and Robotnik?"

Antoine went quiet then. He wasn't sure how to answer that. For some reason his brain had ground to a halt. "I do not know. I... this-" he waved his hand at the A-board. "It is confusing. It is unusual English. I do not know what you expect me to be thinking of it."

They both went quiet and Antoine realised that he didn't feel terribly happy about how he had spoken to the counsellor. But it was true: he found it all quite confusing and didn't want to think about it any more.

After a few moments she glanced at the clock and said, "We've reached the end of our first session so I suggest we stop there."

As they went to the front door Antoine turned to her and said, "But Madame, I do not understanding why you teach me this. What has it to do with the princess?"

"You will find that you feel one or the other of the two positions we talked about some of the time, maybe even most of it. They are an important part of how many people - you included - cope with their friends and colleagues and enemies. Watch yourself this week, Antoine. And watch all of the people you come into contact with. You may find that you see examples of both positions all around you. From there, we can build a better picture of your life and Sally's."

And with that, she waved goodbye to him and he returned to Knothole.

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	5. IU-, I-U and Antoine

I+U-, I-U+ and Antoine

Over the next seven days Antoine watched the other Freedom Fighters. He wanted to watch his beloved Sally but more and more he found himself watching his hedgehog comrade instead. The seahorse had been strangely interested in Sonic, but somehow it didn't seem to be because she was impressed by him. In fact, Antoine had a distinct feeling they'd never met. Which was a puzzle.

Sonic was as much of a fool as ever, just as Antoine had told the counsellor. But however much he tried to decide once and for all that Sonic was indeed valueless, he couldn't. The hedgehog was _capable._ Somehow he caught Sally's attention every time. He had a talent for filling the gaps or solving last-minute problems in Sally's ideas and helping them to work. His presence was enjoyed, not only by the princess but also by Bunnie and Rotor and, Antoine noticed with a sinking heart, everybody else in Knothole.

During an evening session around the campfire where Sonic once again seemed able to pick and choose who he spoke to (but seemed eager to talk to everybody) the coyote realised something unsettling: that his bad feeling towards Sonic had more to do with Antoine himself than with the hedgehog.

What had the seahorse said? Antoine was in the I'm OK you're not-OK position, where he decided he was valuable and Sonic was not. _Well, this is certainly to be true,_ he decided as he watched Sonic boast at Rotor while Sally rolled her eyes and then smiled, and Antoine boiled inside.

And what about Rotor? Antoine wouldn't have thought that he felt I'm OK you're not-OK about him, but now that the coyote thought about it he wasn't so sure. He'd felt unwilling to forgive the walrus for joking with him the previous week and although Rotor had initially apologised, he didn't seem very interested any more in seeking Antoine's forgiveness, which Antoine now realised he hadn't given.

How did Antoine feel about that? According to the counsellor's theory he should want to blame Rotor. And that was exactly how he felt. He found his outrage at Rotor's stupid plan boiling in his veins. But as idiotic as Antoine believed it had been, he couldn't help but realise he was holding on to it for longer than anyone else around the fire would.

_Ah, all of this is the yuck!_ he thought, and concentrated on Sally instead. Even though she didn't love him, watching her always made him feel better.

xXx

Antoine went to his third session full of angry and strange emotions. He sat opposite the counsellor and leaned his elbows on his knees. He'd been so angry in the past week, thinking about Sonic and the others and about the I'm OK you're not-OK concept.

"How do you feel today, Antoine?" she asked and waited, eyes on him, for an answer.

He shrugged. It wasn't that he didn't know how he felt, it was more that he felt tired from all this anger. But he didn't like to admit his tiredness, it felt like weakness - and he hated showing weakness. The 'help' she'd given him so far had only made him feel worse and he felt skeptical that any of this was helping.

The seahorse smiled. "Do you think you can put that into words?"

Antoine sighed and pinched between his eyes. "I am not the sure. I have been so angry with Sonic." He took his hand away and looked at his fingers as if he'd managed to pull the confusion of his thoughts out of his head and might be able to actually _see_ them. "And the only thing that has been making me feel better is the princess." And yet, something about that had felt a little bit, well, not-right in a way he couldn't explain. But it was time to hear his counsellor's diagnosis, he supposed. "What is the wrong with me?"

"I don't work in terms of what is wrong with people," the counsellor answered. Antoine blinked at her, not understanding. She sat up a little straighter and gesticulated as she explained. "My school of training understands behaviour like this: we are born happy and trusting but often learn that we have to behave in certain ways to get our parents to look after us the way we need them to, and we keep up those behaviours for the rest of our lives."

The coyote blinked again, this time with surprise. "So you are meaning... I am not sick? Or bad?"

She smiled. "I don't think so."

"Except that I do this I'm OK you're not-OK," he reminded her, because she had told him he did it, after all. "And that is the bad."

"That isn't something I am labelling as 'bad'. I'm more interested in how you adapted to your parents. So did you think more about that position?"

Antoine shook his head - he had thought about it but was more interested in talking about this 'adapting'. Especially if she wanted to talk about his parents. "Ah, please. I do not think I understand this adapting. How do you mean I adapted?"

The seahorse tickled her chin with a webbed finger as she thought about this. "Perhaps I can explain. When a mother has her baby she might feel happy and confident about raising him, completely ready for the task. Or she might be inexperienced at motherhood, or stressed, tired, sick or any number of things, so that when she nurses her baby he intuits that she isn't happy. Even if her unhappiness isn't about her baby he will believe it is because he is so dependant on her and in any case, doesn't have the life experience to think otherwise. He will adapt to suit what he thinks are her needs so that she is more likely to give him the care _he_ needs."

Antoine was very unsure about this, very unsure indeed. "But a baby cannot be doing anything. It is the _maman_ who looks after the baby, not this other ways around. He cries, he sleeps, nothing else. She looks after him. How can he be, ah, adapting?"

"He might try to cry less, to pretend he doesn't need things when really he does because she doesn't seem to like it when he has needs. Or he can convince himself he doesn't care when she ignores him, because he can tell she mistrusts herself so he believes her lack of self-trust and 'fits in' with it. The point is, he will solve the problem in his own way. Whatever mother needs, he will try to conform."

"So how is my I'm OK you're not-OK be coming into this? It is as if the baby thinks his mother is the problem and not him!"

"You're right." The counsellor stood up and went to the flipchart, where she found their plus-sign diagram from the previous week. "That is one of the possibilities this chart shows. Do you remember last week when I said we make early decisions about ourselves and others?" She waited for him to affirm this, which he did tentatively. "We decide either that we are basically valuable or we are not," (she pointed to the vertical line as she said this.) "And in addition, we decide whether Other - starting with mother but we later apply this to other people - are valuable or not. This makes up our existential position."

"Ah... existential?" he asked, pulling out his notepad. "What does it mean?"

"How we exist, how we _are._ How we go about _being,_" she answered and waited until he had finished noting this down.

"And you believe mine is I'm OK you're not-OK." he prompted.

When she looked at him she was smiling again, a gentle and positive smile. "We don't get locked into one of these and stay in it. We usually have a favourite that we keep coming back to but that's the nearest we get to being stuck. You can be in any one of these four at any time."

"I am thinking that I understand that one." He pointed to the position diagonally opposite 'his' position. "It is I'm not-OK you're OK, yes?"

"Yes, that's right."

"So what is that?" He stood up and pointed to the bottom-left square.

"That is a very grim position, and means I'm not-OK you're not-OK. People in this position are often depressed and don't get very far in life."

To Antoine, this seemed like a judgemental statement. "Why?"

"Because the motto of the person in this position is, 'I get nowhere with people.' They believe, by definition, that they are not capable people able to complete a task, and that neither is anybody else."

Antoine had to agree that this sounded very hopeless. "So the motto for my favourite position is what?"

"I want to get rid of other people.' Contrast that with the opposite position of I'm not-OK you're OK whose motto is, 'I want to get away from other people."

"I am not to be the sure I understand," Antoine said.

"Perhaps I can explain it another way," said the seahorse and Antoine once again noticed how she never seemed to get impatient with him. It made him wonder...

"With your favourite position you want to fight people off, to get them off your territory. But an I'm not-OK you're OK will want to get off other peoples' territory instead. They tend to be frightened off easily, or at least easily convinced they're less worthy." Both Mobians fell silent as they contemplated the contrast.

Then he remembered something. "You said last week that Snively and Robotnik make a pair because Snively believes he is Not-OK and that Robotnik is OK, and Robotnik is agreeing with this. But you just said that a person in Snively's position would be wanting to get away from Robotnik. Why is it being that they stay together?"

"That's a very good question. It's because when we are in each of these positions we tend to want to keep reinforcing them. If Snively left Robotnik then who would be there to remind him that he is less worthy than Other? Robotnik provides a service for him. He feels a need to stay with Robotnik so he can feel belittled again and again."

Antoine realised his jaw had gone slack and closed his mouth with a quiet _click._ "That is... very much a tragedy," he said at last, eyeing the two diagonal positions with respect, and no small amount of wariness.

The seahorse took her eyes off him to look at the graph. "I think you're right. It is."

They were both silent for a while, and returned to their seats so that they could think comfortably.

"I do not know which of those I feel about Robotnik," he said after some thought. "I have dedicated my life to getting rid of him, but when I am in the Robotropolis..." He watched the counsellor carefully as he said this. He was enjoying her respect and suspected he could admit his terror of Robotnik to her without forfeiting it, but he didn't like to take the risk. "...I admit I am..." Her strange eyes watched him attentively, sensitively, patiently. "Well, I am afraid."

There, he'd said it.

Something silent passed between them and he knew he hadn't lost her respect. "That is an interesting observation. And you're right, it is possible for us to switch between these two, sometimes very rapidly. But I think it's safe to say that most people feel a sense of both disdain and fear of Robotnik. We are all in an extreme situation with him, and you are more so than most of us."

They paused again as Antoine thought about this and how these two positions related to himself and Sonic. But before he could think further he needed to understand the last remaining position. And to test a thought he'd had about it.

"Seahorse, I have to be noticing you are never seeming to be in any of these places with me. I know you are in a position of 'you're OK' - where you see _moi_ as OK - but you..?"

The seahorse smiled and nodded. "I strive to be in this position-" she pointed to the last remaining square. "-which is 'I'm OK you're OK.'"

Antoine had had an inkling such a position existed but somehow it had been hard to see. And he still found himself skeptical. "What is the motto?"

"I am in flow with other people," she answered. When Antoine looked confused she elaborated. "I believe in the basic value of other people and of myself. If there is a task to perform, I trust myself to be able to complete it - within reason - and I trust others to be able to do the same."

"But what about for people like Robotnik?" he asked, sure he'd spotted the flaw in the concept.

"This is what I meant when I said the basic value of a person isn't about what they do, but what they are," she said. "Robotnik does a lot of things I see as not-OK. But my position about his very self is still 'You're OK.' I think that if he chose to let go of his anger and grow as a person, he could do it."

Antoine was stunned. He was still trying to decide how to answer - and even what to think, of the situation and of Seahorse herself - when the counsellor said, "We've come to the end of our session, Antoine. We've covered a lot of theory today and I hope it proves useful to you."

"Yes," the coyote mumbled, too full of thoughts and feelings to pay very close attention to her. "I will see you the next of week."

She looked carefully at him and said with a kind smile, "Take care of yourself, Antoine."

xXx

The rest of the day was a blur for Antoine and he was glad that he and his comrades had already planned the next mission. So he spent the rest of the day writing, and relaxing, and wondering.

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	6. Sonic Boom - A Dissection

_A/N: Thank you for reading so far. I'm glad that this story is proving quite popular, judging by the number of views! This is an unusual story and I'd really like to know what some of you think. Please can you review, even if only to give me a couple of lines telling me what your overall thoughts are about it? I'd really appreciate it!_

Sonic Boom - a Dissection from Antoine's Pespective Incorporating _Sonic Boom,_ written by Len Janson

"We had a mission that was requiring Sally to work with Robotnik's computers," Antoine explained to the seahorse. The mission hadn't gone well and he already felt bad about the telling. But on the other hand he had been able to observe himself and Sonic in their mutual game of I'm OK you're not-OK, so he'd made the choice to tell his counsellor the story. "This would leave her blind, so she and Sonic would stand by the computer with him keeping the watch so he could to be protecting her if needed.

"We entered by the air ducts. Sonic ran ahead of us and then stopped and waited for Cat and myself to catch up. He runs so fast, faster than anybody else, so how could we keep up? Especially Cat..."

Cat's part in the story was the worst of it and Antoine could already feel his skin chill and his jaw tense. The seahorse seemed to notice this but said nothing yet.

"But he still made sure he told us to run faster and that he was waiting. He loves to tell people he's waiting! It makes my blood rage!

"Then a robot opened the grille beside us and looked inside. I was terrified it would see us and so was Sonic - I saw the look on his face - but then it opened its mask and it was my princess in disguise. I felt better that he had been afraid of her too." He stopped and let the sense of calm wash over him again, the calm he'd felt when he'd seen Sonic's fear and not felt I'm OK you're not-OK because of it. Somehow Sonic's fear had seemed reasonable, part of what made him Antoine's friend. "But I notice this one thing: he even told her, 'about time!' but she did not seem to be minding."

"What do you think happened there?" the counsellor asked, curling her tail comfortably behind her feet as she asked.

Antoine stroked his chin and hmm'd about this, more to show that he _had_ thought about it than because he needed to think about it now. "I am thinking that he said something I'm OK you're not-OK but the, ah, _sting_ was not to be there. A friendly I'm OK you're not-OK. Does this to making of sense?" He watched her for approval. He thought he'd got it right but didn't like the threat of being wrong.

"Yes, it certainly does. I can explain that to you whenever you like but it would make for another theory-heavy session. Shall we talk about that or would you prefer to tell the rest of your story?"

He thought how he felt about this and decided he wanted to tell the story. After all, he didn't want to be such a coward that he took the chance to escape that as well. "I am thinking I will to be finishing this story.

"Sonic told Cat and I to watch for danger and then was to be asking if there were any questions. He only said it so that he could embarrass me in front of Cat because when I started to ask what he wanted us to do if any robots came, he interrupted and left."

The seahorse nodded thoughtfully. "He left you with no idea how to respond to him and Sally being seen?"

This made Antoine think. "Well, I am supposing that I knew what to do, really. You see, we have a plan only to be disrupting a mission if a robot clearly sees one of our number who is 'working', as Sally was. In this case our plan would say that I would inform Sonic by radio, one message for if I thought he could be handling the attack by himself and another if he could not. It was Rotor who invented this idea," he added, and realised he felt true respect for the walrus for this elegant idea.

"So what prompted you to ask?" The question seemed purely curious, not judgemental.

"I..." He wanted so much to say something flattering about this, but he knew the truth. "I think I... wanted to be reassured. I do not like to wait, it gives me the fears and the sweatings.

"But anyway, he left the duct and they walked away to the computer. I remembered about I'm OK you're not-OK and did not want to be doing it so I called after them to have the safe journey."

Her long snout dipped as she nodded her understanding of this. "And how was that for you?" she asked.

"It felt good, like freedom somehow. But I would be to liking for Sonic to do the same back." He sighed and then went back to explaining about the team's protocols. "It is a difficult decision to be making, to be cutting off a mission or not to. Sonic so often sees danger at the same time as me - he is very, ah, how you say, alert - and I saw he had noticed robots coming. But he was clearly talking to the princess inside and was not choosing to leave. We must often do this, decide in the moment. I chose not to call them out."

Now came the difficult part of the story. He shifted in his seat and saw the seahorse had noticed his change of mood.

"Something happened next," she said, her brow low with concern, and he nodded.

"I am not proud to say that I looked at Cat for the reassurance too. I think that was part of what made me damage the mission..." Antoine wasn't sure any more whether he wanted to tell the rest of the tale.

"Can you tell me more about that?" she asked gently.

"I wished Sonic and my princess would finish fast, but they were there for so many minutes. Cat did not have much to say, only that computers can be tricky and that I should relax. He had the good point so I took him at his word, relaxed - I leaned against of the wall - and realised too late I had leaned against the grille. I made it fall out!"

He sighed with guilt for what he'd done, and continued, his voice flat. "Sonic distracted them while Sally came to Cat and myself. We ran to escape and as we ran I hoped she had done everything we needed. And I felt embarrassed that I had been making such a mistake in front of our new member, Cat. I had been hoping to look competent to him." He paused as he realised how honest he had just been. How, only three weeks ago, he never would have made such an admission.

It hit him then, just how unusual the relationship between a Mobian and a therapist was. He looked at the seahorse and wondered what he might be able to do in a relationship with so little judgement. There was more, well, _space_ in it.

"I realised soon after this that we had lost Cat, that he was gone. When we stopped running, the first thing I did was to sit and hide my face in my arms - I felt so bad about what I had done." He stopped again and looked at the counsellor, needing to see her non-judgement.

"It sounds like that felt very bad for you," she said. She seemed to have taken his story to her heart.

He relaxed a little. "Sonic arrived - of course he caught us up the very quickly - and the first thing he was wanting to know was what I had done." This was the part Antoine had most wanted to tell the seahorse about. He felt brighter as he realised he'd told the worst of the story for the time being and leaned forward to tell her the next part. "I noticed that he did the same as I do: he played I'm OK you're not-OK with me! I had expected him to demand this question of me but it was only when he asked it that I realised! I was so surprised - and if I tell the truth Madame, pleased - that I did not to be arguing back. I only told him what had happened. I do not know whether this being honest was the best thing, but I am thinking it had the good effect," he said tentatively and smiled at the counsellor, for he had more good news.

"What _did_ happen?" she looked animated, as lively and bright as he felt at that moment.

"My princess had found a message from her father and wanted to be finding him. This meant going to the Dark Swamp. And she said this very thing: that she was wanting me to go with her. To protect her. Sonic was the, ah, skeptic but she insisted that she wanted me there! I felt so proud!" He felt happy and warm as he replayed the scene in his head, and then said more thoughtfully, "She made a fool of him or disagreeing with her. She has never done this to me and seems to be a way she flirts with him, but I felt happy that she was to be doing this. I think maybe this was my playing of I'm OK you're not-OK, and now that I think of it I am not so sure I like that I felt good about it."

"Purely out of interest, how did Sonic react to that?" she asked.

"He did not seem to feel, how you say, cut down a peg." He stopped for a moment and considered this. "He told us he would find Cat and be catching up with us, and my princess told him to be careful. Their relationship seemed repaired by this."

The seahorse thought about this for a few seconds and then said, "Okay," and continued listening.

"I did not like the swamp. I thought I saw a flying surveillance bot two or three times but was never quite the sure. Sonic says I see things that are not really there, but he always seems to see what is real and deal with it." He wondered for the hundredth time whether the hedgehog was really right about that or whether it was just a symptom of Sonic's teasing. "But soon I was to be having the shakes. I bumped into Sally and it got even worse.

"She ask me if I was all right and she sounded worried for me, like I was a child. I did not be wanting to admit how scared I was so I said I was _shivering_ from a cold, not the trembling from the fear. I am not proud that I pretended to be sick so that she would not think me afraid, but it was all I could to be thinking of at the time." He thought about this for a moment. "I must to be thinking of a better story some time."

The counsellor looked as if she had thoughts about that but he wanted to complete the story so he carried on.

"And yet, once I felt bad for telling her about this fake cold, the only thing I could think to do was suggesting something even worse. Seahorse, why do I do this? Want to sabotage myself, I mean? It is a strange thing to do."

She held her breath for a moment as she thought. "It would take a while to explore that properly. This mission certainly brought up a lot of points for us to talk about in-depth."

He nodded. "I was knowing the very last thing she would want to do was leave," he continued. "My princess wanted to find her father, how _could_ she want to leave? But that is what my stupid mouth said. I am embarrassed for it even now."

"How did you deal with the situation next?" she asked.

"I shut up. Sally is good at recovering my messes," he said bitterly, then shook himself free of the feeling and spoke on. He was rapidly getting used to the fact that the seahorse forgave him for these mistakes, so he found that he forgave himself. He paused as he felt the truth of this and then spoke on. "She walked on and I followed.

"With this silly stuff going through my head, I went quiet but the next thing I said was still stupid! I had already asked how much further it would be and I asked once again! Again, this self-sabotage, always!

"We found Ironlock Prison and I felt so afraid of entering. We had a bridge to cross and it was not safe, I tell you! I said so to the princess and she told me not to be the worry-wort."

"But you didn't agree with her?"

Antoine thought before he answered. "No, I did not. But I would never say so to the princess. She was worried about this bridge but I think was maybe a little stuck to the spot with the fear. It started to fall apart so I grabbed her hand and dragged her onto the other side. We only just made it and I had to climb up and then pull her onto strong ground." And then he sighed with frustration and rubbed his forehead. "I still had this health thing in my head and when I saw how close we were to the prison I said that going in would be bad for it. What am I, Seahorse, sixty?!" He fumed at himself for a moment.

"Do you believe it _was_ bad for your health to go in?" she asked.

"Well... in a way, yes. All that stress... but then we go through stress all the time. I do not say this about going into Robotropolis."

"Mm hmm. But Ironlock felt more of a threat to your well-being."

"Oui, oui. Perhaps this was because of the swamp." He didn't feel quite convinced by that but wasn't sure why. "Anyway, I tried to persuade her to turn back. I do not know why, I think it was because the bridge was the gone. I was not to be knowing how we would get back and I think I wanted to know how my princess would be solving the problem. I wanted to see her solve it right then. But of course she wanted to go in and this was rightly so, so we did.

"She walked inside and I followed her. I said I was right behind her. I meant it to be reassuring but of course it was not, I see that now. It was again, this self-sabotage. Why did I say this? Why do I do it so much?"

"It definitely seems worth chasing up," said the seahorse and, before he could work out who would be chasing what, she stood up and wrote, 'self-sabotage in I'm not-OK you're OK - for Antoine' on the sheet on the A-board. Then she settled into her chair again.

"We were inside and she found evidence that her father had been there. She looked so emotional and I thought that even if I could not be brave for her I could be comforting so I put a hand on her shoulder. But she did not accept this either. She just looked at me and managed to say, 'come on', and walked away from my hand. What can I do for her if she will not accept anything from me?" He had felt bad about this at the time but now that he described and re-lived it in the honest environment of the counsellor's hut he found it especially distressing. His eyes welled up with tears and he had to pretend to have a coughing fit to deal with it without the seahorse noticing.

She saw it anyway, curled a little in her seahorsey way and then stood up, walked to a shelf and back and put a box of tissues down beside him. He paused, stuck half-way between realising he could cry in from of her and the need to hide his shame, and then she spoke. "This is a safe environment and your tears are very welcome here. Take all the time you need." Her voice was gentle, so much so that even her nasal sound was gone.

He cleared his throat. "We are not having the time. I am having more to say."

"Take all the time you need," she repeated, touched his shoulder and returned to her seat.

He tried to give himself the time but it seemed difficult. When the worst of the sadness had gone he sniffed and carried on. "It was breezy in there and a door near us slammed. I do not to be liking loud noises and I jumped. Embarrassingly I ended up in my princess' arms. After everything that had happened I found myself being honest - or at least a little honest - and saying I just wanted to be in her arms. She was not liking this.

"Sonic caught up with us soon after this and what do I do? The first thing I do is jump with the fear. Again," he added irritably. "I am grateful that at this time my princess was noticing an old computer which she was investigating."

"She found a message in this computer from her father and I was wanting to look happy about this, so I said how _fantastique_ it was. I did not to be knowing what this message said but my princess was sure he was alive.

"And then I do not know exactly what happened next, but the ground opened up and we fell through into some kind of messy underground tunnel. And then Sonic did something else I'm OK you're not-OK."

The seahorse digested this and nodded. "What was that?"

"We saw a red light glowing in the dark ahead of us and he said he would go and see what it was. He ran, and at his speed that meant spraying us with the mud in this place. I think he was doing this on purpose but was also doing something we needed him to do. And he was splashing the mud on me again when he came back! Madame, could he have been doing this to keep me in a not-OK position?"

"That's an interesting question. What do you think?" She seemed only interested in his thoughts, his answer. If she had an opinion about it he couldn't see any evidence of it in her body language.

_She must to he having her own thoughts about this!_ Antoine thought. "I think maybe he did. But also that he was being the thoughtless and did not see what he was doing. Ah, I do not know, you are supposed to be this expert!" He looked at her for an answer and tried to ignore the fact that his aggression didn't feel quite right against this mild-mannered sea creature.

The counsellor tilted her head and smiled. She didn't look upset by his anger but he could see she'd noticed it. But she wasn't mocking it either. "I am here to facilitate your goal, not to tell you what to do."

Antoine felt sullen then. "Please tell me what facilitate means." He attempted to salvage some dignity by finding his notebook and pencil as she explained.

"Facilitate means to give you the materials and knowledge to achieve your aim by yourself."

He looked at her in surprise. "You do not be giving advice?"

"No," she answered simply.

"But what is it I am paying you for?" he said, outraged.

"Antoine, if I gave you advice, how could either of us be sure I had given you the _right_ advice? What if I felt biased towards telling you to do something you didn't want to do? I don't know every little detail of your life and couldn't possibly know it all. If I gave you advice it could clash with something else in your life. "

Antoine paused. "I... I had not thought of this."

"And what if you were able to think of solutions that hadn't occurred to me, that were better than what I'd suggested? It's too likely that would happen."

The coyote sat still with his pencil tip poised on his notepad. "This is... This is the true." He didn't say it with conceit, it just seemed a reasonable thing to think.

The seahorse had stopped to watch how this was sinking in with Antoine. Then she said, "And there's something else too." Something about the way she paused made Antoine listen more closely. "Do you remember when I told you I strive to be in I'm OK you're OK?" He nodded. "If I am in that position I am committed to trusting in your ability to solve the problem yourself."

The truth of this dawned on Antoine then, and it was a truth as warm as sunlight, bright and welcome. She trusted him, this Mobian. But there was one thing he still wanted to know. "Madame, I believe I understand. But if you have to tell me this knowledge so that I can accomplish what I came here for, how can that be you seeing me as OK?"

"There is a difference between doubting another person's fundamental value and recognising that they don't have a certain set of knowledge. If a person truly lacked value then nothing would ever make them achieve by themselves. If all that person needs is knowledge for them to achieve by themselves then they are OK. The most capable person in the world still needs the right knowledge in order to be effective."

"Yes, I think you are right," he said quietly.

The counsellor stayed quiet with him for a while as he thought about all of this. Eventually Antoine decided he wanted to keep talking.

"So I think Sonic was playing the I'm OK you're not-OK," he sighed. "I knew he was doing this and I still did not want to play it with him so I did not get angry, just brushed the dirt from my uniform as best that I could. Perhaps the fact that there was danger made it easier for me not to be angry. I knew I would need his protection. "

"Oh yes," said the seahorse. "You mentioned a red light. What was it?"

"It was a monster! It cornered us but somehow Sonic knew it was a robot and ran through its body with us. He destroyed it. I had the no idea, and neither did my princess!

"I looked for the way out. Well, we were soon finding our way out of the sludge, into these tunnels and beyond. I think my princess had all of the information she could get about her father and we had work to finish in Robotropolis. Cat was still in danger there.

"We went back to Robotropolis and Sonic went to look where he was seeing Cat before. He came back and told us Cat had disappeared - we still do not know where he was taken." He paused and took a moment to mourn his short-time comrade. "I hope it was the quick and the painless.

"But..." he sighed, because the final piece of good news didn't seem anywhere near good enough. "We successfully made the stealth bots blow up. It was quite a sight, I suppose."

Up until now he and the seahorse had been talking about his feelings but this was a subject he suspected he knew more about than she: the need of freedom fighters to sometimes have a hard heart. "I feel terrible about this - I felt that Cat was in my charge and I failed him. He was old and we always need more help against Robotnik and it was his first mission. I failed him and I failed the team." He felt on the verge of crying again but managed to pull himself together. "But we are not able to get sentimental." It was only too easy for this to come out wrong and he looked pleadingly at this understanding Mobian. "Do you understand, Seahorse? Because we Freedom Fighters have this reputation sometimes, for being too tough in here." He patted his chest. "It is not that we were not to be caring, but if we let ourselves be dragged down by these sad feelings then we are in more danger from Robotnik. We must be alert always."

The seahorse rubbed at her jaw and thought deeply about this. "I think... I think I do understand. Perhaps not in every sense that you wish, but I understand that sometimes we must make hard decisions that only _we_ know the logic behind."

They both fell quiet and considered this, each in their own pool of emotions and histories and thoughts.

Antoine listened to the background tick of the clock and found he had nothing more to say. He felt tired but cleansed, and replete with information and insights about himself and his comrades. Now all he wanted was to digest it and to learn more the following week. And the fifty minutes had passed.

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	7. Confusion from the Inside

Incorporating _Sonic and Sally,_ written by Pat Allee and Ben Hurst

Antoine made the best effort he could at concentrating on the planning, but despite this he kept finding himself gazing through the map and thinking about interactions from other times. It seemed that every day brought him several more memories and realisations and it was all starting to crowd his brain. Most of the conversations he took part in and listened to took on a new meaning as he listened and he was fascinated by it.

"I think we should put the bombs here and here," Sally said and pointed to two points on the Robotropolis map. She looked up at her companions. "Who wants to do this?"

Perhaps it was because Sally had asked a question that Antoine pulled out of his thoughts to listen. He noticed the way she looked around at everyone - including him - and decided that as she was trusting them all to complete the task. He guessed that she was in I'm OK you're OK. (_Or could she be hiding her doubt that I could do it, which would make it I'm OK you're not-OK?_ he wondered. _Or even looking to us for support because she could not find the courage to do this by herself?_ That would be I'm not-OK you're OK. Possibly. He blinked with surprise that this last option had even occurred to him. His brave princess, doubtful of her own ability..?)

But the conversation was moving on. "Count me in, Sally-girl," Bunnie answered. (Judging by Bunnie's tone, I'm OK you're OK.)

"I'll take the SWATbot production line," Sonic said. (Firmly in the I'm OK camp but perhaps with a friendly you're not-OK element. Or was Antoine too keen to see it as that? And what did it mean if he was?)

"Bunnie, you pull the main power switch," the princess concluded. "I'll be outside and monitor progress from there."

Antoine realised that from most people he would interpret this as a cowardly move, anything to avoid being in the centre of the danger. But with his growing clarity he realised that it was very strange of him not to interpret this move of Sally's as cowardice. _It is because I want her to be perfect,_ he realised, remembering something the seahorse had said to him once. And then he realised there was a difference between her actually being perfect and him simply wanting to see her as perfect. _But why do I want to see her as perfect?_ he wondered. For the first time he wondered what was behind his attraction to the princess. And then there was the idea that his imagining of others as being cowards might not be right in the first place. Antoine wished he had his notebook with him.

Someone nudged him. He looked: it was Bunnie. "Quit starin' Sugah," she advised him quietly out of the corner of her mouth.

Antoine realised how he must have looked and felt embarrassed. For a moment he didn't want to check where anybody else was on the four places. (Later he realised his wish to shrink away from everyone else was a powerful example of Seahorse's I'm not-OK you're OK.)

"Will you want any backup?" Rotor asked Sally. Antoine didn't quite have time to interpret which position this question represented before the answer came.

Sally thought, and cast an inquiring glance at Sonic. They both answered an once: "No."

The walrus looked at Antoine and then back at Sonic and Sally. "Then we'll wait at Knothole for when you come back." (_I'm OK you're OK,_ Antoine thought, realising that Rotor rarely shrank away from Robotropolis duties.)

Antoine couldn't see any way of taking part except for waiting with Rotor so he nodded his own agreement. In any case, he wondered whether he'd be safe in Robotropolis with his mind so occupied.

"Okay guys, thanks. Rotor, are you ready to start making the bombs?"

"Any time, Sally."

The princess nodded and moved the spanner holding one corner of the map down. "Okay well, that's it until tomorrow, guys." And as she folded the map they disbanded.

Antoine followed Sally outside and was disappointed to see that so did Sonic. He wanted to talk to her. Alone if it had been possible. But it seemed he'd have to do this with the hedgehog listening.

He took a deep breath. _I'm OK you're OK,_ he instructed himself. "My princess?"

She glanced around at him. "Yes Antoine?"

Sonic rolled his eyes, which the coyote noticed but decided to ignore. "Why did you not to be picking me?" It sounded a little whiny and he made a mental note to adjust for this for the rest of the conversation.

Sally looked like he'd poked her with a stick. "I kind of did. I asked everyone, but you didn't..." She looked a little unwilling to finish the sentence but he could see what she meant.

"You had your chance, man. If you wanted the gig how come you didn't take it?"

Antoine drew himself up to his full height before realising what he was doing and tried to relax his shoulders. "I was thinking, my princess, that if you were wanting another bomber..?" He vaguely touched his chest as if to volunteer.

Sally looked confused. "I think two is enough. It would have meant making more bombs which takes time, and if Robotnik caught any of you guys he'd see what you had in your backpacks and interrogate you even harder," she answered. "We can't take that risk."

"Admit it Ant," Sonic said with his hands on his hips and a wry grin. "You wimped out."

"I did not to be the winking out, as you call it!" Antoine couldn't stop getting angry now. "I have the much in my mind and I did not-"

"_Wimping_ out Ant! It's _wimping._"

"Guys," Sally's voice cut through their hard stares. "Break it up. Sonic, didn't you say you had to go somewhere?"

Sonic reluctantly dropped his aggressive stance to look confused and scratch his head. "Uh... Did I?"

"Yes you did."

There was a pause as Sonic tried to remember something that seemed all the more on the tip of his tongue because Sally seemed to remember it so much better than he did. Antoine listened to this latest exchange and tried to interpret what Sally was doing. Something I'm OK you're not-OK, he thought.

"Uh, okay." Sonic turned to walk away, still looking confused but maybe, Antoine thought, with some understanding that he'd been dismissed.

When Antoine remembered who he was standing with he found the princess already peering curiously at him. "What is it, Antoine? You've been looking..." She narrowed her eyes as she tried to find a name for her intuition. "Distant, lately."

He wanted so much to be honest with her and it was only with the greatest difficulty that he held back. Antoine had decided from the start that he wouldn't tell anybody about his therapy just in case they didn't react well. "I... I have been thinking," he said weakly. Now that he was in this situation he realised he'd put off coming up with a cover story for too long.

"About what? Has something happened?" she asked and looked so genuinely concerned that he felt tempted to carry on looking weak. But then he noticed that this would mean being I'm not-OK. _Do I want the princess to think of me this way?_ No, he did not. So that meant that he had to look I'm OK instead. But at that point he couldn't do anything about that. It wasn't his fault-

And then he saw the pattern.

"It's my fault," he said in a daze, knowing only that he had to take responsibility. Not blame, because Seahorse had said that was a not-OK act, but responsibility, which was OK.

Sally looked alarmed. "What? What's your fault Antoine?"

Something connected in his mind and he stumbled through the words, "It is my fault that I did not to be volunteering." He shook his head to clear it. "No, I understand that now. I take full responsibility, my princess."

Sally struggled for something to say and then said, "Well- I- It's nobody's fault Antoine! If you didn't want to take the mission you didn't have to."

"No, of course. I am sorry to have bothered you my princess." And before she could argue (he knew she would say something about not being royalty in such a small village) he bowed and left.

It was a clumsy exit, but he had so many ideas to write down and think about that it was the best he could do. And he _did_ take responsibility for that.

xXx

For the following two days Antoine kept himself to himself but especially kept away from Sonic, of whom he had had enough lately, and with Sally, because he felt too vulnerable to appear the way he wanted to appear with her.

And that meant he made what he later believed was a mistake. He only learned that the ground squirrel he'd smiled at from a distance the previous evening was a robot replica when Sonic came back to Knothole with the _real_ Sally after phase two of the mission. He'd thought it was odd she hadn't looked concerned. It was as if she'd forgotten the strange conversation they'd had about volunteering.

His lack of observation made Antoine feel very I'm not-OK indeed and left him wondering how the heck he was supposed to be I'm OK you're OK when he felt so confused and fragile and flawed.

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	8. Antoine Discovers the Drama Triangle

Antoine Discovers the Drama Triangle Incorporating _Sonic and Sally,_ written by Pat Allee and Ben Hurst

"...but I am embarrassed to say I did not to be noticing this robot-Sally's strange behaviour as Tails did until Sonic and the others came back from Robotropolis. I think that if I were to be feeling the normal now, I would have seen. But this week I was too deep inside my own brains."

Ah, it felt good to tell somebody that.

"With what in particular?" asked the seahorse, webbed hands linked studiously in her lap.

"With this I'm OK you're not-OK. But I think maybe now I need to know more. You wrote something on the sheets-" he pointed to the A-board. "-but I could not to be remembering what it was."

"Ah yes, of course I did." And she went to the board to look for the note. She found it a few pages down: "Self-sabotage in I'm not-OK you're OK - for Antoine," she read aloud. "Mm hmm, I remember what I wanted to say about that now." She turned to look at him with a subtle look of excitement. "I have another diagram to show you that might help. Would you like us to start exploring it?"

Antoine had been feeling rather lost, but his counsellor's enthusiasm was infectious. "I... why, yes Madame!" New material could be very good indeed; if nothing else it represented a change from considering everybody's positions.

The pair exchanged a friendly smile before she flipped to a clean page and drew a large, downward-pointing triangle. "This," she said, "is the drama triangle. We can use it to understand how we move in relationships. I think the first position I'll introduce you to is the Victim." She wrote this word beneath the lowest point. "The Victim position corresponds to the I'm not-OK position."

"Oh," said Antoine, who felt disappointed about this. "Do you mean all of this is to be the same thing as you have already been teaching me?" He noticed that there were three points on the triangle and not four so it couldn't be exactly the same, but the similarity Seahorse had admitted to had left him feeling rather deflated.

"It has similarities," she said, "But there are some interesting differences on here."

"Such as what?" he asked, perhaps a bit more sarcastically than the counsellor deserved.

"Such as these two," she waved the graphite around the top two points before writing 'Rescuer' over one and a word Antoine didn't recognise over the other.

"What is that?" he asked, tentatively curious again.

"Persecutor," she answered. "It means attacker, of sorts. Or 'critic,' perhaps. Yes, that's the better word," she murmured to herself and wrote it in the bottom corner, away from the diagram.

Antoine was unconvinced. "And these are so interesting why?"

"Because they're both I'm OK you're not-OK places, but each has a different viewpoint. They look at the Victim differently."

This had Antoine's attention. Some of the memories he'd accessed during the past few days unfurled themselves just a little more. "How..?" he asked carefully.

"The Persecutor wants to attack the Victim. Or criticize. The Rescuer wants to help the Victim."

"But helping... This is good, yes?"

"Not in this form. Think of an imaginary civilian in Knothole Village, who decides for you that because you've been to Robotropolis on a mission you _must_ be exhausted and that you _need_ to rest for the remainder of the day, have chicken soup, not be asked any difficult questions including what happened on the mission, and more. Or they insist on talking to you until you've told them the terrible things that have happened - even if nothing terrible happened at all. They do this even though you're clearly healthy and reasonably happy and able to look after yourself."

Antoine laughed a little at this image. "I can to be thinking of a one who is sometimes doing this. But a Freedom Fighter after a mission is often not to be a Victim. We are usually well when we return."

"That's true," said the counsellor, "But Victim means something about the way the Victim's mind works, not their outward circumstances. Let's choose another example to help. Let me think..." She furrowed her brow as she thought.

"I think perhaps I am knowing one," he said. "For a while, Bunnie was..." he thought for the best words. "too caring for Rotor. I think it was because she had only just been roboticized and was sad about her limbs and wanted to be making herself feel better. She looked after Rotor, who has not always been so confident. And myself..." he added as the memory came back to him more clearly. "She spoke for me some of the time," he said quietly, gazing into nowhere as he remembered, both the visual image and the emotions that had come with it.

The seahorse nodded. "That sounds like a good example. Can you tell me more specifically what she did?"

Antoine thought. After a certain amount of hmm'ing he said, "She would ask for things - food, sometimes - so that Rotor did not have to. And she would be translating me for the others. My English-" He stopped himself, and looked awkwardly at her.

She looked intent but said nothing, only blinked and waited for him to finish his sentence.

"Well-" he said, shrugged and tried a weak laugh. Then he explained quickly. "My English is not so good sometimes."

She nodded, although it seemed to be more at acceptance of what he'd said than agreement. "And how do you feel about that?"

Whatever he had been expecting her to say, it hadn't been that. He looked at his hands and scratched absently at his palms. "I wish it was the better. I know others do not respecting me for it some of the time."

He heard her make a soothing humming noise in response to this and waited for her to say more, but she didn't. He looked up at her and saw her nodding slowly and looking sympathetically at him.

"I do not know whether it was Bunnie making me be bad at it by not letting me practice... But I am." He shrugged. "And that is that." He wanted to move on and glanced at the board in the hope the seahorse would start teaching again.

After a final few seconds of silence, she did.

"Mm, okay. So you see that she nurtured you both - Rotor and yourself - unhealthily by doing things in such a way that you and Rotor were discouraged from helping yourselves."

"Yes," he said before realising that something felt a bit wrong about admitting to it.

There was another pause and Antoine got the feeling that Seahorse knew far more about what was happening than he did.

"So Bunnie's position in that dynamic could be described as the Rescuer, putting both you and Rotor into a Victim position."

Antoine shuffled in his seat. "But we are Freedom Fighters and we rescue all the time. How is this any different? Rescuing, it is what Bunnie _does._"

"Let me ask you a question," the counsellor answered. "How would you feel about leaving somebody you'd found in Robotropolis alone? How would you feel about leaving them to escape and leave and manage all of that by themselves?"

"Well! I think this would be bad. Especially if they were stuck in the prison cells. They would be needing us to help!"

"Okay. So you as a team have resources that make you able to save a person who objectively needs the help."

Antoine looked up. "What is this word?"

"Objective?" the seahorse checked with him, and he nodded. "Something that is objectively true is a fact. Subjective, on the other hand, is an opinion."

"Ah," he said and waited for her to return to the training.

She didn't. Instead he found her looking purposefully at him. She said nothing, only looked like she expected something.

Antoine cleared his throat. "What about the other place? This point number three?" He was surprised at how sheepish he felt about asking.

Instead of going back to her teaching she turned to face him, the graphite balanced between her hands. "We made an agreement a few weeks ago," she said. "That if I used a word you didn't recognise you would ask what it meant, I'd explain it to you and you'd write it down."

"Oh!" Antoine took the hint, rustled for his notepad and tried to think of what to write. But by then he'd forgotten which words he'd wanted to write down. "Ah - I wonder if you can tell me what they were... again?"

Still that look.

"...Please?"

The silence carried on. Please apparently hadn't worked. Then: "Are you aware of what happened between us then, Antoine?"

Antoine felt like he was withering under her strange-eyed gaze, good-natured though it was. In fact, it reminded him of Sonic's mockery!

"I do not," he said, unsure what was expected of him.

"You moved into the Victim position and invited me into the position of Rescuer."

He felt taken aback. "What? But I did nothing like this! I forgot the word and I asked and now you are not telling, that is all!" He felt like saying that she was being unfair but held back.

She still said nothing, only kept up that smile that was on the verge of being a Sonic grin.

"I did not!" he insisted after the silence had begun to stretch out uncomfortably. And then he realised that he felt angry. "Some counsellor you are. What is this? It is the rubbish!"

"That's an excellent movement into a Persecutory role, Antoine."

He gritted his teeth. "What. Are. You. _Talking_ about?"

She walked to her seat and settled down, and the worst of the tension in the room seemed to dissipate. "Tell me something Antoine: what would you like me to do now in light of that conversation we just had?"

"In honesty?" he asked, although he already knew her answer which she supplied anyway with a nod. "I think you should apologise!"

"And how do you feel about the fact that I'm not showing any sign of apologising?" Although the Seahorse didn't look sorry, the wry Sonic look had gone and she looked genuinely interested in his answer.

He held his breath. He wanted to say that he felt angry, but he knew she was doing something more significant than simply trying to wind him up. He let his breath out. "I feel angry. But I do not understand what it is you are doing. Please..."

She dipped her head in affirmation. "When we first agreed to manage words you didn't recognise it worked well. You would signal that you needed to stop and would ask me to clarify and define the word. Then you would write it down. Would you agree that this system worked well for you?"

Antoine thought about this. "I am thinking so, Madame."

"I noticed earlier in this session that you asked me to define the word 'Persecutor' but didn't write it down. Can you identify what prompted you to stop using the system we'd developed?"

He paused. Now that she mentioned it, it was rather strange. "So you are thinking that I made myself a Victim by not recording the word?"

"What do you think?"

Of course. Seahorse was always much more interested in his opinions than her own. Antoine didn't particularly want to admit to making himself a Victim and he shrugged to get rid of the discomfort the idea caused. "Well, even if I were to be admitting to this, why did you become this, ah..." He paused and realised he still hadn't learned this word properly. Clearly there was something he had to do before this conversation could be made easy. Or as easy as possible. He put his pencil tip to the paper. "What is it you are calling this attack position again?"

Seahorse smiled. "Persecutor. A person who criticises as a means of putting the Other person into a one-down position."

"Hmm," Antoine said thoughtfully to his notepad. "I am thinking it is strange for me to do this. I mean, it is strange that I did not write this down at first, but it is feeling stranger now that I have written it. Why is this?"

"We often have a favourite position on the drama triangle. Bunnie's might be Rescuer, although I don't know her well enough to be sure and you told me she'd stopped Rescuing too much. A moment ago I played Persecutor for the sake of demonstration.

He felt confused. "But I became a Persecutor also because I became angry with you," he said. "Can we both to being the Persecutor?"

"No, indeed we can't. Or not in this situation, at least. There can't be a Persecutor without somebody to see as a Victim. I Persecuted you - fairly gently, or at least that's what I aimed for - and you felt that you wanted to be the Persecutor in the conversation so you fought me for the position."

Antoine was stunned. "I did?" He thought back to how she had stood there silently gloating before sitting down and starting an ernest conversation. "Did I win?"

"I resisted for a while and then I moved off the triangle completely. So you were in Persecutor, but you found you had no Victim. Whether you want to call that a victory is up to you."

Antoine genuinely couldn't tell whether he did or not. But in this environment, with nobody but himself and a gentle pipefish, what was the meaning of any such victory? He decided to think about that one later. His eyes flicked to the triangle on the A-board. "You can do that? Move off this triangle, I mean."

"Yes. Doing that corresponds to moving into I'm OK you're OK."

He realised he'd been absently pinching at his bottom lip. "Oh."

He passively waited for Seahorse to start talking again but secretly wished she wouldn't. He had so many thoughts to process now that all he really wanted to do was go away and give himself time to think.

For her own part, the seahorse saw Antoine's absent gaze and understood that he was doing some very deep work, and perhaps that what he needed was to digest it in whatever way suited him best. As she gave him time she thought over what she'd taught him so far and tried to work out whether she needed to point out any other features of the drama triangle. Her client, a Freedom Fighters, had high-risk and important work to do. The last thing she wanted to do was send him away liable to put himself in danger. It was time for her to mention this, for her piece of mind and to be sure he understood the risk his vulnerability posed to him.

"Antoine," she said.

His yes cleared reluctantly and he fixed his attention on her.

"May I ask what you're doing to keep yourself safe? I notice you're deep in thought and I know you put yourself at risk as a Freedom Fighter."

"Oh, I can volunteer for less of the work. We all must say if we are wanting to be helping with a mission. I will be fine. _Merci,_ Madame."

She smiled and nodded, and then went silent to wait for him to speak more of his thoughts.

"Sonic does what you did," he said at last.

Seahorse tilted her head. "How do you mean?"

"He goes into this place of Persecutor. He wishes me to be a Victim." And then he paused with confusion. "But also he is wanting me to be a better Freedom Fighter." Then he realised what he had said and felt his stomach cramp. That was the truth of it: he simply wasn't as good a Freedom Fighter as Sonic was.

Abruptly he pushed the idea away before it had too caustic an effect. "You said in some situations there can be more than one Persecutor. How can this be?"

If the counsellor noticed his sudden rejection (_or was it fleeing?_ he thought) then she didn't mention it. "Imagine that we sat down together to complain about Snively. And we had a conversation about how awful he was and what bad judgement he had for supporting Robotnik. We could both come up with all kinds of things to say about how we disapprove of him and the things he does. In that situation, we would both be Persecutors - supporting each other in our Persecution - and he would be our Victim, even if he wasn't here."

"Hmm..." said Antoine and rubbed his chin. "So when I was coming here at first, I told you about Sonic and how he is a fool and I hoped you would be agreeing with me. So then, I was being a Persecutor and trying to make you a Persecutor also. This is right, yes?"

She nodded. "That's right."

He furrowed his brow as he thought more about that session and how he'd tried to lead the conversation. "I wondered... and perhaps sometimes still am wondering... why you did not agree that he was bad when that was what I was telling you."

"Do you have any ideas why?" she asked.

Antoine sighed. "Perhaps..." He could feel that he was angry again and tried to think about the best way to address it. "I wished to Persecute him and wished you would too. But you did not join me. So I felt alone. But Madame, you do not know him and I do. Why did you not accept that perhaps he is as bad as I say? Hmm?" He hoped that she could cope with his lashing out in this way.

"It is true that I don't know him so I cannot guess how extreme or mild his 'badness' is. Antoine, it is not that I disagree. It is just that I've never heard him talk, never spoken with him. How could I know how he truly is?"

"Because I tell you!" he exploded, furious that she was defending the hedgehog. "He is so much better than everybody else and why do I have to listen to it, ah? Why? Why does he make me to look so bad? I do the best I can and it is not good enough. It is not good enough for Sally, it was not good enough for Cat, it is not good enough for anybody. Why do I even try?" He folded his arms and smouldered, like a fire that had burnt out.

She remained quiet as he put his head in his hands and used his fingertips to try and massage a little of the tension out of his scalp. Eventually he said, "Sorry," to the floor.

"I don't feel any particular need for an apology." And then he heard her shift position on her seat. "Antoine, you've reached an important stage in your therapy. How would you like to go on?"

He shook his head. "I get nowhere. I get nowhere with this. I listen and I think and I get angry and I do not to be wanting this." He huffed and kept glaring at the floorboards, resentful and hopeless.

The counsellor's voice was gentle. "When you first came to me you were keen to tell me that Sonic was bad and that you were a better catch than him for Sally. Now you are aware that Sonic has strengths - perhaps including ones you don't - and that they represent a challenge to you. That is an important change. And... I would like to ask, have you noticed any differences in the way you see Sally?"

Antoine was so surprised by this change in subject that he looked at her. "The princess? I..."

He felt it then, and shuddered at the realisation. He could hear himself, only a few short weeks previously, saying _she is perfect. Nothing about her needs to change._ But now he didn't agree. It wasn't so much that he could put his finger on what she should change, but he realised that he saw her differently. As no longer perfect.

"I have noticed some differences," he said numbly, looking not at Seahorse but at some point beside her shoulder. "I watch her and I see that she is sometimes I'm Not OK. And... I do not know if she ever is You're Not OK but... But I hear her sometimes, and..."

"Is she ever You're Not OK with you?"

"No. I do not think so. I don't think..." He would need to file that one away for later. _In fact..._ he thought to himself, and pulled out his notepad. He wrote a reminder to himself to think about this.

When he had finished he looked at the counsellor again and could see that although she wasn't smiling, there was a light in her eyes. "You're learning," she said.

He nodded. "I think I am."

They sat in silence together for a few moments before Seahorse said, "I wonder if we should take a look at your reasons for coming to me, and see whether they are still the same."

Antoine thought. "When I came I wanted to understand why Sally did not love me. I asked you to help me learn what I could do to make her be loving me."

"You did. I remember."

"And now," he said, and then went quiet in thought. But he struggled to come up with any more words. "I still..." He felt exhausted, then. "I do not know, Madame." He looked up at the clock; he had only a short while to go. "I...I think I would like to go."

She nodded slowly and then stood up. "Then let's leave it there."

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	9. Antoine Meets Vulnerable Sonic

Antoine Meets Vulnerable Sonic Incorporating _Ultra Sonic,_  
written by David Villaire

Antoine's exhaustion reduced but stayed with him for a couple of days while he desperately tried to understand the tangle of thoughts and feelings his world had become. What he'd first thought of as a simple exercise - learning to make Sally love him, however Seahorse wanted to phrase it - had become a complex three-dimentional puzzle where everything seemed connected to everything else.

He sat down with his notebook and tried again and again to write a new goal, but he couldn't decide quite what it was he wanted any more. He wanted Sally to love him, he still felt sure of that. But now he saw how unlikely it was. The unlikelihood seemed to be for several reasons but the most important, he realised, was Sally's _autonomy._

If she had autonomy, how could anything he did to attract her be guaranteed to work?

At other times he looked at Sonic, listened to the hedgehog's and Antoine's own conversations together, and realised that he had a foggy understanding that somehow, all of his feelings came back to Sonic. His fear of inadequacy was something he only very grudgingly admitted to and even then, only in his more openly curious moments. He tried to convince himself at one point that Sally had autonomy except for when Sonic was around - and the idea held a great appeal to Antoine's frightened, angry, inadequate-feeling self - but he knew it could not be true and quickly abandoned the idea.

Eventually he decided that he would ask Seahorse if there were any other models of understanding he could learn that might help him untangle all of this. And in the meantime, he tried to calm his fears of simply being not as good as Sonic by reminding himself that Sonic had super-speed and Antoine didn't, and that that was an unusual case of affairs between rival males. Accepting this observation was hard work and felt rather unnatural, but Antoine found that with patience and practice, he was able to do it.

He distracted himself from that line of thought by considering the positions of Victim, Persecutor and Rescuer. By the end of the week he was rather fluent in it, and it made controlling - no, influencing - his friendships a little more satisfying.

A few days later he felt better and attended a mission to Robotropolis to find discarded parts of the roboticizer machine.

And then the hedgehog confounded him again, this time by showing weakness.

xXx

Antoine felt like his brain was full to bursting in the days before his next counselling session. So it was with relief that he sat down opposite the seahorse and told her that he had things to talk about.

"We had separated into two groups and I was with Madamoiselle Bunnie and Rotor. We looked for old roboticizer pieces. Rotor is the best to know what is a piece of the machine and what is not, but between us we were not finding any. So at the agreed time we went to _rendezvous_ with Sonic and my princess.

"They had not been achieving their objective either but Sonic reported some excellent news: that he and my princess had found his Uncle Chuck. This was very exciting for all of us because we are not really having parents, and Monsieur Hedgehog is a kind of parent to us."

Seahorse looked confused. "So why does he stay in Robotropolis?"

"He was roboticized a long time ago," Antoine explained. When she nodded and settled again, content with the knowledge, he continued. "They told us he was in someplace called the crystal mine. I asked where the crystal mine was.

"We took a lift to the mine in one of Robotnik's shuttles. As we went there my princess could be seeing the pollution outside of the windows." Antoine sighed with frustration and disgust. "He must even be polluting the underground! It is incredible, she was right. But she and Rotor both went, ah, well - I'm OK you're not-OK about it. Persecuting. In fact, Rotor did something very unusual and got angry and said he would wish to be hurting Robotnik if he was ever getting his hands on him. I noticed that this was I'm OK you're not-OK in the way you described - he wanted to fight Robotnik instead of running away from him, and to make Robotnik a Victim. Fascinating, no?"

"That is indeed. Good catch," she smiled.

He smiled back at her. "Interestingly, Sonic then told Rotor to be quiet. This could have been I'm OK you're not-OK but I am not thinking the way he said this was like that. This was Sonic just wanting to know what was going to happen next without distractions. I am surprised Madame, but I notice I have started feeling more kind to Sonic."

The seahorse hmmed her interest in this. "How, exactly?"

"I am not seeing him as a fool so much. I think, after you told me about this triangle of drama and that we can be stepping away from it I have tried doing this a few times." But he had more to say so continued his story. "We saw Uncle Chuck! Sonic ran after him which is a rash move - Sonic does these a lot - but for once I think I was absolutely happy that he did this. He has a talent for being able to do things without doing the planning first." He stopped, surprised at his own words, and then continued.

"But Monsieur Hedgehog... he was still a robot, in his mind as well as his body-" Antoine tapped his temple. "He was next attacking Sonic. Bunnie caught and restrained him. It was so very sad and very shocking to see Monsieur Hedgehog so... savage. It is not like my memory of him. Sally gave him a power ring to hold which made him remember.

"And then..." he paused as he relived the memory, which for him was a powerful one. It represented some very important things to him, the return of his pseudo-parent being the least of them. "Sonic begged Charles to remember. I so rarely hear Sonic be so weak. It was like he was a Victim, like you said last week." But it felt uncharitable to say this and he looked at the counsellor for guidance.

The seahorse noticed his look. nodded and said, "Would you perhaps describe him as 'vulnerable' at that time?"

He smiled with delight. "Yes! Yes, that is a much better word!"

She smiled back at him. "That's something to do with the next thing I can teach you. Shall I make a note of that? And then we'll get back to your story." He nodded. She got up, scribbled something on the A-board and then returned. "So what happened next?"

"And then... well, as you say 'vulnerable', and it was good to see his vulnerability, ah, pay off perhaps? Uncle Chuck came back to life and Sonic was so happy he cried. So did his uncle.

"I enjoyed very much to say hello to him. I wish I could have been warmer but I think I have always been quite, what is the word? Formal. Hah, I saluted him! But it was wonderful that Uncle Chuck greeted me in the same way - and with a bow, no less!"

The seahorse laughed, and Antoine realised he hadn't heard her laugh before. "A bow, really!"

He was laughing as well by now. "Yes, all very playful! Sonic decided to get Chuck out of Robotropolis and I agreed, but Chuck himself told us we could not. He said there was work to do. To be showing us he led us down to the main part of the mine.

"We had to slide down a pole to get to the mine and Uncle Chuck went first. I had not expected him to at his age and being, ah, a thinker instead of a hero but he did. Sonic said that this proved how much he was his uncle and I could not to be helping but think this was true. I think... I think it has felt good to talk to somebody with Sonic's confidence but much friendlier to me. I liked that Monsieur Hedgehog was with us." He stopped talking for a while to feel the gap in his heart left by his own family. His own father was roboticized somewhere in that foul city. But he hadn't invented any power rings, so how could they bring him back?

"What he had to show us was an enormous crystal. It was an energy source, he said, and Robotnik was planning to use it."

The seahorse actually looked a little worried by this. "Oh. Goodness." She shivered. "I admit I feel quite..." she gazed at the floorboards to find the right word. "...uneasy about some of Robotnik's plans. But please, carry on?"

"Well, ah, if it is helping you Madame, we stopped him." She nodded, mostly reassured, and he carried on with his story. "Uncle Chuck made a plan to stop Robotnik using this crystal. The first thing that happened was that Sonic fought a SWATbot in front of everybody. And I noticed something." He waited for his counsellor to ask what it was.

"What was it?"

"My feelings. They were not the, ah, bitter towards Sonic. He was working for his uncle and I think I felt better about it. And, although I had not thought of the difference between 'Victim' and 'Vulnerable', I felt good about having seen his weakness." He sighed with frustration. "That is not what I mean. Something weak about him but..."

"His authenticity, perhaps?" The seahorse suggested.

"What is this meaning?" He asked and, with a smile meant for her, found his notepad.

"Authenticity is about being genuine in the way you show your feelings. Being authentic means showing your real, true emotion."

Antoine wrote this but found himself thinking. "Perhaps this is not always a good thing for the Freedom Fighter to be doing. If we were to be..." he checked his phonetic spelling of the word. "au-then-tique all of the time we would not be able to be functioning as a team."

"How do you mean?"

"Well, I am thinking it is often that Sonic is not authentic. He looks brave and teases SWATbots when perhaps he is afraid, if he was honest. I have seen him look afraid just a few times when he is thinking nobody can see."

Seahorse nodded. "You've made a good pickup, there. Authenticity isn't safe in every situation. In fact, it is risky even when there are no SWATbots around and we are surrounded only by our friends. And I imagine you're right: a certain amount of bravado must be vital for your job. But imagine how we would be if we never showed our authentic feelings? What would our lives be like if we pretended to feel something other than our real feelings for most of the time?"

The pair fell quiet in contemplation of this.

"Why did you say authenticity is risky even when we are with our friends?" It seemed an odd thing to say.

The seahorse thought. "Let me put it this way: how do you feel about the idea of telling Sonic you are afraid you're not as good a Freedom Fighter as him?"

Antoine worked his mouth as he tried to answer, and after a few moments struggling, managed it. "I do not know what he would say. Ah... perhaps mocking, perhaps serious, kinder and being a friend about it. But I think at a later time he would be, how you say, using it against me."

"Then there would be a risk in telling him how you authentically feel?"

Antoine understood the point. "Oui," and reflected on the idea for a few moments. When he felt he'd thought enough for the time being he looked at his counsellor again, who looked ready to listen. "Rotor and the princess and I went to break the power circuits to stop the crystal being winched out." He stopped for a moment. Something had happened at that point and he knew he hadn't dealt with it as well as he'd wanted to. "I wonder if I might ask you something?" he looked searchingly at her.

"What's that?"

"I said the job would be a 'slice of pie', but I was still concentrating on whether there were robots around so I did not really hear Rotor, but he corrected me. Do you know what it is he is likely to have said? I think I should note it down now."

She looked steadily at him. "I think I know what you meant. But would you rather depend on me to tell you these things? We won't always meet up like this, remember."

And Antoine realised for the first time in weeks that their relationship was, indeed, limited. He tried to ignore the loss he felt about this and said, "Do you mean I should ask Rotor to repeat himself instead?"

"I can't tell you what to do. What do you think would be best?"

"Well then, I will. You are right. I just made you responsible, didn't I, and that was not right." He knew this was the truth, but he couldn't help but feel a little irritated.

She smiled. "You have made the choice to ask your friend and to use your time with me for the task we contracted for. So what happened then?"

"The controls were tended by a robot and Sally saw where was its switch. We made a plan to switch it off and Rotor was nearly killed. And I came up with another wrong thing to say..." He thought to himself and then made a note on his notepad. "I will ask him this also.

"Sonic and Monsieur Hedgehog - and Bunnie - shot the crystal so that it was in many pieces and useless to Robotnik and we all ran to escape." And here he sighed. "And that was where we lost Uncle Chuck."

The seahorse leaned forward in her seat. "What happened?" She looked rapt, and a little sad.

He found this rather strange considering their conversation about authenticity because _he_ didn't feel sad. He couldn't allow a past event like this to make him sad. That was weak, and weakness in a Freedom Fighter meant inconveniencing your team-mates or worse, death. _But is my lack of feeling authentic?_ he wondered. He tried searching himself for feelings about Uncle Chuck's fate but he didn't really seem to find any.

As he looked at his counsellor she said, "Can you tell me what it is you're feeling?"

He thought. To express himself came with difficulty. "I was thinking about how you looked sad when I did not. And then I wondered why I do not feel very sad about Uncle Chuck. But I do not feel very much. Is that bad-" _Ah, of course. She believes there is no bad, only adaptations._ "I mean... What does it mean?"

She had tilted her head to listen intently to him and said, "Are you aware that blankness is an emotion?"

"But there is no feeling to it. How can it be?"

She thought for a moment. Then she said, "Imagine that a baby is brought up within one of the polar circles, to a nomadic tribe. At first he tries to initiate play with his mother but she is always travelling and stows him in a side pouch of her reindeer all day, so she can't. In the mornings and evenings she's too busy helping tend the herd or cooking or maintaining the tent to play. So he gives up feeling spontaneous joy because it never gets returned. But he needs to feel something so he makes joy a taboo feeling for himself and puts a different feeling on top of it. The same happens when he hears predators howling or loud noises or the carrier-reindeer stumbles and he gets scared. All his mother does is calls, "Don't be afraid," and walks on because she has too many miles to cover to stop and tend a baby she knows isn't really in peril. He isn't really reassured but realises that expressing fear doesn't give him the results he needs, so he censors that one too. The same happens for anger and the same for sadness. He puts another emotion over them all, covering the original emotion like a blanket. What do you think he will feel in the end?"

Antoine tried to wrap his mind around all of this. "Madame, I do not know. I suppose he would be making, how can I say, a barrier to feeling. But you are telling me this is how I feel instead of being sad about Monsieur Hedgehog?"

"I present the idea to you as a possibility. Do you feel that it fits?"

"I do not know." There were so many implications to this that the coyote felt he wanted to unpack his thoughts about that by himself. So he said so. "Ah, Seahorse, I think I will decide this in my own time. But I would like to finish the story.

"Uncle Chuck's mind was being taken over again by the programming. He was still a robot, after all. Sonic wanted to take him to Knothole, away with us, but it could not be. Bunnie had to drag him away and into the escape cart." He was aware he sounded a little stiff as he talked about all of this. "And when we were in there Sonic cried. It is so rare I see this. Everybody said what they could to cheer him up and I realised I could not stand back and refuse to speak. While the others were talking to him I... I thought about where he was on this drama triangle."

"Where was he, do you think?"

"Victim. I think perhaps truly Victim and not Vulnerable but I am not sure. And I wanted to be kind about this and remembered what you had said about not being Persecutor or Rescuer. It seemed the best thing to do was try to be part Rescuer part I'm OK you're OK. So I simply said it was a _magnifique_ job he had done, even though he did not do this alone but with Monsieur Hedgehog and the rest of us. I did not feel the happy with myself for this - I think if I had known more about what you are teaching me I could have done better, said something better. But I did not." He wondered over the churning mix his emotions had become, including a sense of dissatisfaction, even guilt, over his almost-indifference to Sonic's tears. Like the arctic mother he had practically told Sonic not to be sad, for his own benefit and not for the hedgehog's. And now he part wished he could take it back, part felt irritated that the situation had arisen in the first place. He needed to give his brain a rest.

He finished the story. It was more or less told, but for a sense of completion he said, "But anyway, Sally told him she had copied some of Uncle Chuck's programming and that she might be able to change him back permanently one day. Sonic cheered up as best he could about this but he was angry about Robotnik. Rotor said all of our families could be returned if this was to be happening and I felt... Madame, I did not feel very much excitement."

She nodded as she took in his words. "Is there a possibility you censor - or perhaps reduce - your sense of joy?"

Antoine paused. That was a complicated one. "I... I do not know, but I will think on this." And he noted it in his book.

He looked at the notes he'd written a few days ago. _'Contract'_ and under that, _'Other diagrams or models?'_ and _'Sally autonomy?'_ "Ah yes, I nearly forgot," he said. "You said we should think again about why I am here, yes?"

She gave one, firm nod. "Yes indeed. I'm glad you remember that too. Did you have any thoughts?"

"I wished for you to teach me more things. Today you have showed me how to be Vulnerable but not a Victim but I would still like more. And about the princess..."

"What in particular about her?"

"I understand that she has autonomy and can decide for herself who she wants, Sonic or moi, but... I do not know. I... I still want to try."

He could sense that it was an unlikely goal and he expected the counsellor to say so. But to his surprise she was very warm and gentle about this. "Of course you do. You've been friends for how long?"

"Ever since I can be remembering." The turn in conversation felt friendly and accepting, almost like being wrapped in a warm blanket and hugged.

"Mm hmm. And you want to be important to her. And she is important to you. You are changing and that means your relationship with her is changing."

He felt heat welling up in his throat. He'd been so busy thinking about how to become her partner that he had forgotten that perhaps she cared about him very much - in her own way. "I- yes. I still want us to be close. But Seahorse... I am..." He closed his eyes and found the courage to admit his true feelings. To be authentic. "I am afraid of what is happening."

"What is the worst-case scenario? In your irrational wildest dreams?"

He opened his eyes again. "Hah, wildest dreams again? Hah! I suppose that she would-" No, that wasn't correct. He tried again. "That I will stop loving her."

He froze in place as he replayed those words in his head. Had he really just been so honest? Was that really what he thought?

The seahorse gave him space to think about this and after a few seconds leaned forward to say, "You are aware that you might... disconnect from her, so to speak?"

He gulped down the ball of heat in his throat. "Yes," he said quietly. "But that is..." Tears welled up and he looked away. "Seahorse, I cannot talk about this. I am sorry."

And with an empathetic and quietly humming pipefish opposite him, he covered his face and wept. It was only gradually that he stemmed the tears. Eventually he sniffed and looked at her again.

She looked mournfully back at him and regarded him carefully before she spoke. "I think we should reconsider our contract." She stood up and flipped to a new page on the A-board. He watched her meekly, afraid of how much more honesty might be spoken and how he might respond to it.

"So we have gone from a contract where you wanted to know how to change your behaviour to make Sally more likely to love you. Purely out of interest, do you feel you have achieved this, even partially?"

He rubbed at his lower lip as he gazed at the sheet and thought. "Perhaps. I understand more than I did. But my understanding has made it seeming to be less likely."

She nodded. "I think you hinted earlier that you remembered our talk about wildest dreams. When I make a contract with a client - like you - I look for several things. What you actually wanted was important, and still is. So I asked what you wanted in your wildest dreams. But we also have to understand whether it is possible to have what you want. Do you understand now why I mentioned that, way back at our consultation?"

Antoine closed his eyes and thought about the blind wish he'd had for Sally to be in love with him compared to his understanding of her autonomy now. Of course! He'd become angry that Seahorse had made such an apparently pedantic distinction! "I do."

She nodded carefully. "And now we can see that we cannot guarantee the nature of Sally's feelings for you." Antoine felt like he was slowly being pushed towards the edge of a cliff. "We can go forward with either a soft, or a hard contract. A soft contract is one where we explore, like we've been doing for the past few weeks. It has no definite end because nobody ever gets to the end of learning."

Antoine wondered about this but was distracted by his counsellor's continuing talk.

"A hard contract, by contrast, means a contract with a definite end so that we know when it is complete. So it would be a contract to give up smoking, or to hold a spider without feeling fear perhaps. If you can define the end point of what you want, it is a hard contract."

"Which do you think I should be having?"

She smiled gently at him. "The decision for what goal to aim for must be yours. What do you want?"

His heart beat so fast in his chest he couldn't think straight. But he took a few deep breaths and calmed himself as best he could. "I do not know if this is the best of things, but... Please can we be continuing with the soft contract. Teach me more, perhaps?"

The seahorse nodded. "As you wish. There is a lot more I can teach you and I think it will help you very much." She glanced at the clock. "We have reached the end of our time, Antoine. I'll see you next week."

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	10. Escalation

Escalation

The campfire crackled. The stars twinkled. The Freedom Fighters chatted and laughed, and Sally listened to the good-natured banter of her friends and relaxed as well as she was able.

She didn't have any particular reason _not_ to relax, it was just that usually, dropping her guard felt wrong. It was as if it was potentially dangerous somehow. Sonic - sometimes deliberately, usually without realising it - had taught her how not to take her problems too seriously. Bunnie often soothed her with kindness and reason, and even Rotor helped in his own way with his straightforward approach to risk. But still, tension came far more naturally to the ground squirrel than for most and she depended on her friends to keep reminding her how to limit it.

It seemed to come so naturally to them, this reasonable limiting of fear, that she sometimes wondered if they knew how much she depended on them.

She looked at Antoine, aware she hadn't thought about how he might have taught her to have downtime. He enjoyed the arts and wrote a lot of poetry - and in theory this meant he had much to offer when it came to reminding her that there was more to life than war - but the poetry he wrote was so loaded with hints of his infatuation with her. She always made a point of being gracious but she'd never really liked it. In fact, it put her guard up - or at the very least reminded her that she might have to outright reject him one day, which preyed in its own small way on her mind.

_Speaking of which..._ He'd been glued to his notepad for the past few days. She wondered with a certain grim feeling whether he was writing another one. And what had been happening to him lately, anyway? His eyes looked weary and distant, as if he was thinking about some heavy subject matter. He bent over his notepad and when he wasn't writing felt the edges of the paper and the pen. Deep in thought and restless.

"Yo, Sal," Sonic snapped his fingers and she blinked back to the present. "I'm over here."

Of course. She'd taken her attention off Sonic Hedgehog for a minute. Crime of the century. She smiled at the chance to tease him. "Oh, you are?"

"Yeah I am!"

"So?" She prompted with a spontaneous smile.

As he answered, flustered at first but quickly finding his wits, she half-heard Antoine start a conversation with Rotor.

"What, you're still thinking of that?" she heard the walrus reply. "Well... Thanks Antoine, but I'd kinda forgot about it."

Sally looked over.

"Yes," the coyote answered, his face intent. "But I was remembering this and I had not been apologising. It was wrong of me."

The walrus looked like he didn't know what to say. "Okay, thanks. Uh, apology accepted?" He shrugged and gave a small nervous laugh.

"Man," Sonic half-whispered in Sally's ear. "You have got one serious crush on Old Pee Pants!"

"What?!" she answered and gave the hedgehog a withering look. More for the fact she felt outraged by his suggestion than because there was any truth in it. And she felt sorry for Antoine - Sonic could be harsh at times. "That wasn't fair!"

"So?" he said, as an echo of their earlier flirting.

"Sonic, that's not funny!"

"Is so."

How did she ever get into these arguments with Sonic? "Is not." And to prove her point she turned away from him to listen in on Antoine and Rotor's conversation, especially now that Bunnie had joined in.

The coyote scribbled in his notebook. "So it is 'piece of cake'. I understand. So what was this other thing?"

"Uh..." Rotor gazed into the fire and chewed his lip. "Nope, it's gone."

Sally edged forwards. "Was it 'gringo'?"

"Ah - yes!" Antoine said, his face lighting up with recognition (and perhaps pleasure at Sally's help, she wasn't sure). "But what is it meaning?"

She couldn't help but voice her curiosity. "This is new Antoine. You're taking vocabulary notes?"

He nodded. "Oui oui, I was thinking that I am being the wrong in my English sometimes, so now I take the notes."

"You're gonna need a bigger book," said Sonic with a wry grin. Sally knew one of Sonic's taunts when she heard one and waited for the argument to begin. If anything got these two at each other's throats it was-

"How are you meaning?"

Sally felt an actual jolt of surprise. Antoine's answer and facial expression were a lot milder than she'd expected. She looked closely at him, determined to work out what was happening to her old friend. Even in the yellow light of the fire she could see he wasn't glaring at Sonic. No puffing himself up, no raised shoulders. He was curious, that was all. And yet she was convinced that surely his question must have sounded confrontational to Sonic.

"What do you mean, what do I mean?" Sonic answered in what could have been described as a snap - if he hadn't been grinning when he'd said it. But Sally knew it wasn't a friendly grin. "Your English is way not cool!"

"He's not so bad," Sally interjected. The two males looked briefly at her and then fixed eyes on each other again. She found herself surprised by their intensity. Without Antoine's usual reaction it felt... different. She found herself leaning back a little, as if to keep out of their way until she knew what to expect.

"Yeah he is!" Said Sonic. And then his grin dropped. "And another thing - are you gonna take notes on not being a total wuss, Ant?"

Sally felt her jaw drop and saw looks of shock on Bunnie and Rotor's faces too before she swivelled her head in the Hedgehog's direction.

Antoine himself grimaced as if he'd been poked by something sharp.

"Sonic-" the ground squirrel started. This was getting out of hand. Arguments between these two were common, but this was a step up from the usual. Sonic usually mocked - but open animosity?

Rotor looked uncomfortable. Bunnie seemed much the same, wide-eyed and open-mouthed as she watched.

"What?" the hedgehog answered with a shrug he somehow managed to make look aggressive. "You've seen him Sal."

"That's not-" was as far as she got before she reined herself in. It was _Antoine's_ place to answer, not hers. So instead she limited herself to an angry glare and a subtle shake of the head. Which he either didn't notice or ignored.

Antoine, when she turned her head back, looked misty-eyed. Dazed. But not angry as she might have expected. He said nothing, only looked at Sonic for a few seconds as if he was quietly thinking about what to say. "What do you say I should be writing, Sonic?"

Sally blinked with surprise. She looked at Sonic, interested to know how he'd answer.

The hedgehog looked surprised too, and then grinned as if he wanted to taunt Antoine. She recognised it as the same look he got when he got a chance to bait Robotnik. "I don't know, maybe to do something useful once in a while?"

Antoine tilted his head and even smiled a little. "Such as?"

"Whoa man, _I'm_ not the one who stood around not saying anything to volunteer for bomb duty. That was you, man."

Sally found herself sharing a glance with Antoine. And just for half a second she saw something different in him, something she'd never seen before. Yes, there was definitely some kind of change.

Sonic bristled at their shared look. "And another thing. How about you be less of a creep? Like, a _lot_ less?"

Antoine seemed to come out of his daze then and looked ashamed. He sighed and put his notepad away. "Well, thanking you Sonic," he said, his voice heavy as if he'd suddenly become tired of whatever he'd been trying to do. He stood up to go, but before he walked away paused and turned back to Sonic. "If I say another thing that is wrong, will you be correcting me? I will be liking to improve," he said, although his voice was flat with weariness and unenthusiastic.

Sonic laughed, although Sally wondered whether he'd have laughed at anything Antoine had chosen to say by that point. "Whatever, man!"

Antoine nodded in that tired way again and swept his glance over the others. "This request is for all of you." and then he left.

Sally and Bunnie and Rotor watched him in stunned silence as he disappeared through the trees towards home. Once he was out of earshot the ground squirrel turned to Sonic. "What was all that about?" she demanded, full of anger on Antoine's behalf.

"Sal, he's a waste of space!" Sonic had that belligerent look on his face. She knew there was no point in arguing with him once he got to that point. It didn't feel good to her.

"He's doing his best," she said, holding out little hope that saying this would change anything.

Sonic rolled his eyes. "So he's doing his best at being a waste of space. Yeah, great stuff, Sal."

Sally wasn't sure she wanted to talk to Sonic while he was in this kind of state. She decided to leave the fight there and looked at Bunnie and Rotor. The two Mobians were giving each other more uncomfortable looks.

The fire crackled on but the spark of conversation had been dampened.

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	11. The Parent and the Child

The Parent and the Child Incorporating _Sonic and the Secret Scrolls_,  
Written by Janis Diamond

"So Antoine," Seahorse said as she sat down and crossed her legs. "How has your week been?"

Antoine's first reaction was to laugh a little, rather bitterly in fact. There was so much to say he barely had time to say it all. So first, he told her about his tete-a-tete with Sonic over the camp fire, disappointing as it had been. He took care to mention how annoyed he felt with himself and particularly his inability to make things go differently to the usual animosity.

She listened intently. When he was finished she said, "That was quite an event. How did it feel?"

"I felt my heart so fast," he said. "I could feel a lot of me was wanting to be arguing. I tried to be I'm OK You're OK with him and not to be a Victim but in the end it was too much. So I walked away." He sighed irritably. "I failed." He'd been bested by Sonic in front of everybody and he hated Sonic, and himself, for it.

The counsellor seemed to retreat into thought over this and when she caught his eye again, he could see what she was thinking.

"You have something to be teaching me," he said with a kind of wry, complicit feeling he wasn't quite ready for because he still felt angry about Sonic.

"I certainly do," she said with a smile. "Would you like me to teach it to you now? It's quite different from what we've been through so far."

"Hmm..." He considered the longer story he had to tell and decided to tell it later, or perhaps next session. "Yes, why not?"

She nodded and got up to visit the A-board. On it she drew three circles, one on top of the other. The overall image looked like an anorexic snowman. "Now, this is a useful way of understanding how the mind works. Counsellors of my school of thought imagine the mind in three basic pieces. There is the Parent," She wrote the word beside the top circle. "the Adult," which she wrote beside the middle one. "and the Child." She stood back to let Antoine see her handiwork.

"Now. The Child," she continued, "Is the part of us that remembers how it felt to be an actual child. Those feelings remain accessible to us for the rest or our lives. Although we put memories and experiences into here when we were little, we draw on them at different times even when we have become adults."

Antoine tried to cram all of this into his brain but it didn't quite fit. "Ah. Can you explain again, please?" he asked.

"Yes, I think I can. Do you remember that baby we talked about in the polar circle? Let's imagine he didn't end up with that block across his emotions but instead, he was still able to feel his emotions as an adult. Back when he was a baby he felt fear when he heard howling predators in the distance and his mother came and picked him up. He learned the howling was bad news because his mother looked afraid of the sound and protected him from whatever made it.

"Years later he is a grown man, out on the ice. Fishing perhaps. He hears a distant howl and immediately feels afraid, even though it doesn't make much sense for him to feel that way because he is now too big for a predator to catch.

"What happened was that when he heard the howl, the sound triggered him into his Child-" she tapped the bottom circle of the diagram with her graphite. "-and he made that same connection as he had done, when he was little, between hearing the sound of howling and feeling the emotion of fear."

Somehow it still wasn't fitting very well for Antoine. "I am still not understanding. What does this having to do with me?"

The seahorse thought before she answered. "The Child is your emotional centre," she explained. "Whenever you feel an emotion, it is quite likely you are in your Child."

"Quite likely?" he asked. He felt irritated by her indistinct answers and watched her coolly for a response.

She watched him back and he realised she'd noticed his challenge to her. "Yes. It is not definite - emotions can come from elsewhere."

"Then why say emotion comes from here?" he asked with a flippant shrug, his arms folded.

She glanced at the Parent circle. "It may come from here," she said and pointed at it. "The Parent is the state we go into when we feel there are rules to be followed and that we will make sure others will follow them, or if we feel we can look after somebody else."

This sounded clearer to the coyote. "So it is like being a real parent." he said.

"Yes, absolutely. Or anybody who is a parent-type figure, like a teacher perhaps."

"Ah." His irritation seemed to have receded for the time being. "So... Why is this useful, Madame?"

"It is useful because everybody has these three ego states. So if you think of..." She stopped as she saw the coyote find his notepad. "Which word was it?" she asked kindly.

"Ah, 'ego,' I think?"

She nodded. "Of course. Ego is the self. My ego is my sense of _I._ Does that make sense?"

Antoine felt excited by this discovery. He knew this word after all! "Yes, it does! My princess has said before that Sonic has a big ego. I did not know what this was meaning. She seemed to think it was a bad thing."

"Well, it can be, depending on what you want from the other group members. We all need a sense of 'I', otherwise it would be difficult for us to function, especially in groups. So Sally thinks Sonic has a very big sense of himself, and you have described him as having a lot of presence in your group."

Antoine beamed. "So that is a big ego!"

She tilted her head and smiled at his pleasure, which by now was bordering on hilarity. "So I think that gives you an idea of what an ego is."

"Yes!" he laughed. And because he couldn't stop, she started too.

"Oh, I'm sorry Antoine," she said wiping tears of mirth out of her eyes. "But I'm always glad to hear a client laugh. We were in the middle of a conversation, weren't we?" She took a breath and went back to explaining.

"So. We all have a Parent ego state and a Child ego state. And in the same way as a real parent has authority over a child, a person in their Parent state will try to command a person in their Child state."

Antoine hummed at this idea. Soon enough he said, "I am trying to think which of these Sally is usually in. I am wanting to say Parent, but she is looking after the rest of us for much of the time. She becomes Parent with Sonic some of the time. But he cannot be in Child because he is never sorry." He felt angry again as he thought about this. _Trust Sonic to be too arrogant to fit Seahorse's model!_

"Do you believe he would definitely feel sorry if he was in Child?" asked the counsellor.

Antoine looked at her strangely. "But you already said that one person in Parent will make another be in Child. And children do as their parents tell them."

"Do they always?" she asked.

He paused as a thought occurred to him and he began to suspect this new diagram was about to get much more complicated. "Well, they should do," he tried, in an attempt to stem the idea.

She smiled. "But not always," she said, as if saying so finished his sentence for him.

There was a pause. Eventually Antoine realised he had tensed and allowed himself to slump. "Not always, no Madame."

"What else would you say they might do when a parent tells them how to behave?"

"Hmm. Well, they can do as they are told," he said, because it _was_ an option, after all.

She nodded. "So they can adapt to what mother or father is telling them," she said and wrote the word 'adapt' on the board. "Anything else?"

"They might not do as they are told. They might, ah, what is this word?" He racked his brains for a moment but came up dry.

"Rebel?" she suggested. This sounded right to Antoine. And when he nodded, she added that to the board.

He struggled to think of any more. But the idea of rebellious children had caught hold and it brought forth an old memory. "I remember when we were all very young, Sonic liked to have the adventures. He used to be leading us all out of Knothole."

"Mm hmm?" she prompted, and unfurled and curled her tail.

He nodded. "He loved Monsieur Hedgehog and was on very good behaviour with him but not with my princess' nanny, Rosie. He was a rebel with her and loved always to do the opposite of what she was to be saying. He put us in danger. Just like he is always doing now," he added as the observation came to him. He noticed less bitterness in his voice when he said that than he might have expected. Something about understanding the mechanics of the situation helped him avoid the anger. He felt pleased by that.

She hmm'd about this. "And how about you? How did you behave as a little one?"

"Moi? Ah, well, I always did my best to be good. My father was the Captain of the Guard and I was always looking up to him and trying to be like him. I remember him telling me to be good for Rosie. Hah, I just remembered," he laughed as a very old memory indeed chose that moment to surface. "He used to be telling me that because I was the Captain's son I must protect Rosie!" He laughed at his father's joke, and how easily Antoine had been duped. He'd actually taken his father's instruction seriously!

_But... What does this mean?_ he thought, and the laughter died. He continued talking, with increasing numbness, to the corner of the room this time. "I took it on myself to protect the princess. She was in my playgroup. So was Sonic. Father did not say to protect her but I thought of it myself and decided to, to prove I was a good son. And then Sonic would go out in his way to put us in the danger. I did not know how to stop him endangering my princess."

He carried on gazing at the corner of the room for a while. It was only after a few moments he realised he had his hand on his head, as if he had to hold the top of his skull in place and not let the memories pour out any faster than they already were.

"Oh Madame," he breathed and covered his eyes. "This- this is where it was beginning. Oh, _sacre bleu!"_

All he could do was shake his head, his eyes still covered. _Father... Sonic._

For Seahorse's part, all she could do for the moment was wait for Antoine to process this enormous realisation, and its equally huge implications. He would steady himself and be ready to interact again soon but for now, he needed this time to ache, grieve, and pick up the pieces that he would later glue back together in a shape far more useful to him. She glanced at the clock fitted discretely to the wall behind him, the one she'd deliberately fitted opposite the louder clock behind her so that she never had to look obvious when checking the time. They weren't far into the session; there was time for Antoine to digest his realisation and find enough strength to face the world beyond her study door.

When Antoine looked up at her again his facial fur was ruffled and his expression lost and tired. He squeezed his eyes shut again and dropped his head. "I wonder what would my life be like if Robotnik was never to be taking over," he said in little more than a whisper.

She answered just as quietly. "Can you tell me more of your thoughts about that?"

He spoke on dully. "There would never have been such a big adventure to attract Sonic and he would never have started dragging us all into Robotropolis. Because Robotropolis would still be Mobotropolis instead. I would never have felt so much in danger then... And perhaps I could have coped." He glared tiredly at the wall. Eventually he carried on. "And Father would still have been there to teach me how I should be protecting the princess. Instead he was roboticized when I was young and he was never to be able to finish my education." He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair.

"It sounds as if the coup left you with half an education," she said.

"Hah, even less than half, Madame. I could have been betrothed to the princess if only His Majesty was still in place. Sonic would be nothing in Sally's life and I would have been fully trained to protect my future queen. It is all wrong. It is all wrong."

They were silent for a while longer. Gradually Antoine managed to pull himself together and looked at the A-board again. "I would be liking very much to move on now," he said a little stiffly. "What is this Adult?"

She followed his gaze and looked at the board. "The Adult is different from the other two ego states. It's not made up of our emotional history. Instead it uses information available to us in the here and now. And it uses information we've learned in the past about how to do things."

"How do you mean?" he managed to ask, despite his heart feeling like lead.

The seahorse thought about this. "Let's use this as an example: I might feel too warm in here," she said. "My Child response might be to sit tight and not open the window. After all, you are here too and you might be feeling just fine. I imagine that if I opened the window, you would get cold and feel displeased by my action. So I don't.

"My Adult response is different. I have a set of how-to-open-a-window instructions in my head, and I know you are capable of answering the question, 'Are you a bit warm?' Or, 'Would you mind if I opened the window?'"

"But why would everybody not simply be doing the second thing?" he asked.

"Anybody can. But remember how we talked about the Child ego state? About how a person can be in that state and feel they should adapt to what the Parent wants?"

Antoine frowned in confusion, and then nodded carefully.

"If I were to leave the window shut and suffer being too hot, I would be adapting to what I imagine you want."

"But this is not of making sense," he said, feeling a little more like himself. Certainly there was a part of his mind that felt very bruised but he felt able to put that to one side. _Or perhaps I need to, just for now,_ he thought. "How can you know whether I am wanting the window open or closed? You are not the mind reader!"

"What if I were to tell you that as a child, I was taught not only that my elders were to be put first for comfort (such as whether they want the window open or not) but also that I should be seen and not heard? If I am in my Child then I will continue to obey that rule, and not raise the issue of the temperature in here until you do."

"But if I am fine then I might never mention it," Antoine said, irritated. Nobody would ever do this, it was too foolish!

"You might indeed never," she answered.

"And you, Madame, would be left too hot and suffering in the silence-" he said before something important dawned on him. He looked at her in shock. "The plane."

Seahorse looked confused. "What plane?"

"There was something I wanted to tell you," he said. "Rotor and Sally have been repairing a small plane in secret and we were presenting it to Sonic a few days ago. We used it to travel to the floating island of Maga. I am afraid of flying but I flew anyway." He sat back, still gobsmacked by his own behaviour. _How does Seahorse manage to be right about these things?_ "I did not ever tell the others that I was afraid. Not when Sonic and Sally argued about the safety of using the plane, not when we were making the final checks... "

The counsellor nodded, her face alert with interest. "So you adapted to what you guessed was their wish for you to fly with them?"

He nodded dumbly. He looked at the three circles but they didn't inspire him to speak. He felt struck dumb. "I..." he eventually said, "I do not know what I am supposed to be doing now."

"What would you like?"

"To stop doing it. I have been a fool."

The seahorse looked at the diagram. "When we make a contract we make the aim something positive, not negative." When she glanced at him and saw his confusion she elaborated. "So rather than saying you want to stop a certain behaviour, we'd contract for you to start a different behaviour instead to replace the unwanted one."

Antoine felt too tired and confused and sheepish to get annoyed by this pedantic answer, but he said, "But I do want to stop doing this."

She smiled understandingly. "What do you propose you would do to fill up the time you would have spent in Adapted Child?"

He bit his lip as he thought. "I would..." Eventually he sighed. "I am thinking the obvious of things is to be saying I would be in Adult and say I am not wanting to fly. But I..." A sharp piece of honesty pierced his heart again and he looked to the counsellor for guidance.

She'd already seen it. "There's something about stating your needs as an Adult that isn't what you want?" she said tentatively. To call her statement a question was overstating it a little. Instead it was a tentative suggestion and the coyote understood this.

"There is," he said quietly. He held his breath for a moment and then said, "I still want the princess. How can I ever be having her if I choose not to be attending these missions?"

The way she nodded told him she did not consider this a problem-solving request. "How do you go about meeting your need to have her in your life?"

They were both quiet again for a while. He looked at the three circles and wondered at how they could have caused such turmoil in his mind. The words Adapt and Rebel stood to one side of the Child circle and he wondered where else that conversation could have gone. For now, he didn't want to find out.

He looked at the clock; time was moving on. "Madame, before I go I think I should be saying another thing." He looked pleadingly at her.

She saw him struggle with the secret he held. "What is it?"

"Everything I say here is private, yes?"

"As we agreed," she nodded, and recited her only limitation. "Unless I believe you are going to harm yourself or anybody else."

The coyote held his breath and tapped the tips of his fingers awkwardly together before he could bring himself to break the news. "Robotnik is dead," he began and waited for her reaction.

He saw true shock on her face. The seahorse seemed to try and find something to say for a moment before she eventually gathered herself. "My goodness. I admit I'm taken aback by that." A look of relief and tentative joy crossed her face. For some reason he didn't feel as happy as she looked. "How did it happen, may I ask?"

This wasn't the way Antoine wanted the conversation to go but he honoured her request. "He was to be falling over a cliff."

She nodded, satisfied, but then tilted her head. "But there is something else?"

He nodded sadly. In truth he had doubts about the death, but was having trouble knowing why. And the real issue, for him at least, was... "I think Sonic and my princess are... closer because of this." He shuffled uncomfortably, and willed Seahorse to understand and not ask him to clarify what he meant. He found the potential implications too painful to think about.

"You think, or you know?"

"I... I only think." He glanced forlornly at the counsellor before looking again at the relative safety of the floor. He really didn't have any evidence, but the possibility of Sally becoming completely unavailable to him was too hurtful for the time being for him to consider.

"And that brings a lot of pain for you," she said, her voice as soothing as a mother's.

He nodded. But as he sat there, trying to balance his fears, reasoning and suspicion with his natural resilience, something else came up about the whole thing. Something about Robotnik and his own resilience. The way he had survived once.

And then he remembered! "I am not sure he is dead," he blurted.

The counsellor furrowed her brow. "Why?"

"Because before the first time I was to be coming to see you I..." He paused. Now that he revisited the memory for the first time in weeks, he found himself embarrassed by the foolishness he'd proved himself capable of. For a moment it scared him. He shuddered and explained. "I tried to capture Robotnik. I wanted to impress my princess and lured him into a pit. He fell but he was not breaking the bones. And he got out very easily. He had the, ah..." He lifted a foot and tapped the underside of his shoe as he tried to recall the right phrase. "The rocket boots."

His counsellor was already using this information to come to her own conclusions. "So you think he may have employed his rockets to break his fall over the cliff? And even if he didn't, you noticed he doesn't get injured easily."

"Yes Madame, exactly this." They looked concernedly at each other. But their session had come to an end.

Antoine left with his head in the clouds again.

TO BE CONTINUED...

_This is just to let everyone know that I may not be able to keep up posting a chapter a week for a short while. I haven't lost interest in this story, not by a long shot, but I had a crisis of income and had to put my efforts into finding employment. I've got that now but need to write some more of this story so that I can resume posting once per week. But keep checking - I may be able to manage one per week after all!_

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


	12. An Introduction to Rackets

An Introduction to Rackets

_A/N: Hello everyone and thank you for your patience!_

_This is just a quick note to tell you all that I have a job which starts tomorrow. I'll be able to start updating this story regularly soon, but I have a backlog of other stories to write first, as I took on a handful of story commissions to help raise funds for the time I have been unemployed. If anybody wants a story commission please let me know: I charge $8 for 1,000 words and offer a discount for 5,000 words ($35, which gives a discount of $5) and 10,000 words ($70, which gives a discount of $10)._

"Well Madame," Antoine yawned as he sat tiredly down in the chair opposite his counsellor. The week had been so hectic! "Sally found Robotnik. He is alive, I knew I was on the right."

"Oh." Seahorse kept eye contact with him but he could see her processing disappointment. "That was big news for everybody, I imagine?"

"Oui. I am thinking I must have been the least surprised, but it was still the disappointing."

She nodded. They sat in silence for a moment, which Antoine was grateful for - he'd been so busy rushing about and working that he felt a need to be quiet just to acclimatise to the much more serene environment of the counselling room.

Soon enough she said, "Did anything significant come of that for you, that you'd like us to talk about?"

He explained how he'd gone to spend time in his own company afterwards, and about the things he'd considered.

"I see," she said as she rubbed at her chin. "You're really giving your relationships a lot of thought."

He smiled. He was. But his thoughts had turned up bad news for himself. "Towards of the end I was realising that Sally is not trusting me as a Freedom Fighter."

She answered him with a quiet hum and a thoughtful frown. After a moment she said, "There is a model of understanding we use in my line of work which I think is relevant here." He brightened and he sat up, ready to hear about it. She noticed, gave him a warm smile and explained. "We go through eight stages of development through the course of our lives, each with its own challenge. Challenge number five is to learn our identity as adults. We have to work out who we are in two distinct ways: professionally and sexually."

Antoine glanced away and scratched bashfully at his neck.

His counsellor paused and then said, "I'm sorry Antoine. Do you find that uncomfortable? If you prefer, I will make my explanation as painless as I can."

The coyote gave her a quick smile of thanks.

She dipped her head in assent. "As I was saying," she continued, "we have these two parts of our adult identity and it seems to me that for you, both of them are invested in the same individual: Sally. She is both the person you feel it is your job to protect, and also the person you wish to have as your partner. Would you say that's an accurate description of the situation?"

"Yes, I believe it is so." He tentatively decided that perhaps this conversation wouldn't be as embarrassing as he'd feared a moment ago. "But surely a man should to be protecting his love?"

"Do you believe that to be the case?"

He gave her a surprised look. "Yes Madame, of course." The tone of her question implied she didn't really believe it herself. He thought for a moment about asking her what her own beliefs were.

She seemed to be thinking. "But could it be there's a difference between protecting somebody because they are your partner, and protecting them out of professional integrity?"

This made Antoine pause. "Ah... Perhaps so Madame." She didn't say anything to this, only looked ready to hear more from him. After a few moments' consideration he spoke again, his eyes narrowed in concentration. "You said all adults are having this, so she must be having it also. I think in her profession she is wanting a safe Acornia with no Robotnik and no big threats of the national security and she is doing what she can to achieve this. And I am doing my best to be helping her," he added proudly. "And ah, the partner she is wanting is..." He knew the answer to that, but it felt too sad to say.

Seahorse gave him a few seconds' silence, which filled up with sadness. Then she said, "Antoine, are you aware that we don't necessarily choose a single individual as our partner? That wasn't what I meant about our sexual identity."

He felt surprised by this, but for some reason didn't manage to feel particularly optimistic. "Oh?"

She gave one nod by way of reply. "We choose a characteristic, or a set of characteristics. Perhaps a religious Mobian might only want a religious partner. Or a quiet one might only feel attracted to more talkative ones who won't allow there to be awkward silences, which the quiet one feels anxious about. For some adults, gender is more important than others when selecting a partner. My point is that we usually don't pick a specific individual who we decide right from the beginning is going to be our partner. We can do - but it is always worth considering what set of characteristics the adult wants. Unless two people have bonded, their respective characteristics are most likely more important."

"But I think they have bonded," said Antoine angrily. "Sonic and Sally. They have..." He breathed to bring cool air to the heat in his throat. "They are usually the ones to go on missions together. Rotor and Bunnie and myself are more on the outside. Sally always wants Sonic there but the rest of us, not so much. They choose to take us or leave us."

His emotions had risen so much that he didn't feel ready to say or think anything else. He hoped Seahorse would see that he didn't want to talk, and was glad - or the part of him capable of feeling anything other than bitter rage at that moment felt glad - when she said nothing. He gradually realised she was humming quietly, a reassuring motherly sound she made when he felt the most pain. It soothed him, just a little.

He tested his brain for readiness to continue. It didn't want to. "Please can we talk about something else?" he asked tiredly. "Not her partnering. I do not want to think about this. It... it is hurting too much." He wondered what was happening to him, what this therapist was doing, that he so easily admitted his pain these days.

"Do you know what else in particular you would like to concentrate on?" she asked quietly.

"Just tell me something. Something that will make it all easier." If he could have taken his whole life and thrown it on the rubbish heap he would do. He felt angry and sad - and angry that he felt sad - and disgusted with the whole stupid mess.

His counsellor was busy thinking, gazing at the corner of the room with gentle piscine eyes. "I think there's something," she said eventually. She looked directly at him. "I think it would be a good idea if I tell you about rackets. It should help you better understand your emotions. It's quite a big bit of theory - are you prepared for that?"

He nodded and watched her balefully. Anything to get her to start.

"All right," she stood up and went to the A-board, where she found a clean sheet. "I'll teach you about rackets. A racket is an emotion we use to cover another emotion."

That sounded familiar. "Like the baby at the polar circle?" he asked.

"Yes, that's an excellent pickup. So you remember how he had emotions but covered them with something that would get him a better result?"

"Not really. He felt numb, did he not? This was not being healthy for him. No better result there." He remembered that baby. The truths it had demonstrated had seemed very important at the time and Antoine hadn't been able to forget the realisation that as strange as it appeared, numbness was an emotion. But he still had his doubts that Seahorse was really correct about that so he listened, willing to hear more and judge for himself whether feeling nothing truly was a feeling.

"That is very true. Antoine, do you know what a racket is - the racket this system is named after, I mean?" She watched him with an air of expectation.

_Racket,_ he thought. It had something to do with sport, and possibly noise. But how did they fit? "I do not believe so, Madame."

"Let's say you own a shop. You've only just bought and opened it and I come in. And I look around and say, 'This is a nice shop. It'd be a shame if some vandals were to come in and destroy it.'"

Antoine felt confused. Very confused indeed. "Who would be doing this to a shop?" he asked, uncertain where this was heading and very skeptical.

"Well," the counsellor said with a cruel leer that didn't fit her personality. "Granted, this tends to happen in markets where more money can be made. But how would you respond to what I said?"

He shook his head, still baffled. "I would be assuring you that nothing of the sort would happen. No vandals would ruin my store."

Seahorse took to coolly inspecting her claws like a very low budget actress playing at nonchalance. "I offer you protection for five hundred mobiums so that your shop won't be destroyed."

Then the coyote caught on. "Ah, it is a threat!" What was the word? "Blackmail!"

"Oh no, no no no!" she said even more cheesily. Antoine found himself cracking a smile at the sheer unconvincingness of it. "I'm not making a threat. Just pay me the five hundred and I will make sure you never get burgled. Lucky you, being offered such a bargain!"

He broke into a laugh - and she followed suit. "Okay okay," he chuckled when he'd finally regained control. "So it is better for me - perhaps, only just - to accept your, ah, offer. Five hundred Mobiums is the very expensive. But what is this teaching me?"

"That is how we behave when we use racket emotions. The polar baby is lying, both to others and himself, when he feels numbness or whatever he has covered his authentic emotions with. And it costs him dearly - like that five hundred mobiums, the cost of using racket emotions is almost worse than allowing his authentic emotions to show."

Antoine considered this. "I think I am understanding," he said after some thought. "But how is it a bad thing, to have these emotions that are not real?"

"They have their uses. We wouldn't use them otherwise. But deep down we can feel that something is not right. An individual who has taboo feelings and covers them with racket emotions can alienate themselves from other Mobians. And their lives tend to feel like they lack potency."

This sounded strange. "How are you meaning?"

Seahorse considered something. "A person I studied with had a joy racket. Every time she felt a negative emotion - especially anger - she covered it with happiness."

"But this is a good thing, yes? Who is not wanting to be happy all of the time? I am thinking she was lucky."

"She'd been trained to have this racket by her mother, without either of them realising it. Her mother worried a lot, and as a little one, she noticed her mother didn't seem able to handle her own worry. She would become anxious about something and the anxiety would just take over. So my co-student took on the responsibility of keeping her mother from worrying.

"Naturally because she was this woman's daughter and bad events sometimes befall children, sometimes she would encounter a problem. Perhaps she would argue with one of her friends or not do well with her grades. And when that happened she would cover her sadness or fear with joy so that her mother never learned there was a problem and therefore never worry.

"Over the years she became angry that her mother put all this responsibility on her. But she felt she couldn't tell her mother how angry she felt because she believed her mum could never cope with the stress of her own child being angry at her, so she covered her anger with joy again. As the years went by the responsibility to be joyful began to weigh very heavily on her indeed."

Antoine was rapt. "I did not ever to be thinking happiness could be bad. But surely Madame, she was feeling real happiness some of the time?"

"She explained once that she felt something was wrong with her authentic happiness. After a discussion she realised she felt joy, but only very weak. And her anger and fear bothered her from the dark places they'd been banished to in her mind. The joy she covered those two feelings with felt wrong - partly because she understood that joy was inappropriate to some experiences she had.

"I heard her express a little anger once, but she felt so horrible about it that she had to stop. And she cried the whole time, perhaps because of the agony of expressing something she felt mustn't be expressed, but that she couldn't hold in any longer. And she admitted that she had fears she couldn't tell anybody about because again, the risk of feeling something so taboo was too much for her."

Silence descended and Antoine soaked this information in. It seemed terrible to him. How lost she must have felt! "How could she know what she was truly supposed to feel?" he asked eventually.

"There are four basic emotions," Seahorse said, "and knowing what they are and when they are appropriate helps to ground us." She picked up the graphite. "Any idea what those four might be?"

Antoine huffed out a long breath and thought. "I am not sure, Madame."

"Do you know any small children?" she prompted. "Small children often haven't yet learned any taboos."

"Well, Tails is not very small any more but I remember him when he was."

Seahorse nodded. "So what kinds of emotions did he used to show when you first knew him?"

Antoine thought. He thought about the happy-go-lucky little fox cub who always seemed so joyful, laughing as he played with the makeshift toys Sally and especially Bunnie made for him. "Happiness. This is one of them, yes?" He made a mental note to watch Tails in future. Could the fox be taught to feel joy, no matter what, like that student? What did Sonic, with his endless reserves of optimism, teach Tails?

"Yes indeed, it is." She wrote the word on the board. "Any others?"

He delved into his memories again. Occasionally Tails had been prone to tantrums. They didn't happen very often but when they did the little cub seemed so full of rage he didn't know what to do with himself, other than pick up and throw anything within arm's reach and lay on his belly and kick and scream. "Anger? I have certainly seen him to be angry."

The pipefish nodded. "Definitely yes, anger is one of the basic four." She wrote it down.

What else did he feel? Antoine wondered. Well, he supposed that like all babies Tails had been prone to crying. "Sadness," he said automatically even as he wondered about how that crying had sometimes seemed to express feelings other than sadness.

"Excellent, that's another one." She scribbled it down.

He checked his memories for other emotions. Nothing else came up. "I do not know the last one, Madame."

She looked around at him with a kind smile. "How did Tails react to something he thought was dangerous, like loud noises perhaps?"

Then Antoine had it! "Fear! Once, Sonic played the guitar close to Tails and he frightened him with the loud noise." The coyote remembered the time Sonic had forgotten himself and played to his heart's content - and how Tails had woken up in his cot and wailed pitifully at the noise. The princess had been very angry at Sonic, and the hedgehog, once he realised what he'd done, had done his best to make it up to the cub.

The counsellor wrote 'fear' on the board. "So. These are the four emotions we are born with and which we're capable of feeling at the start of our lives. As we get older we learn from our parents which emotions they find acceptable and which they don't, and we censor or change slightly or over-use these emotions so that we fit our family's expectations of us. All the other emotions we feel are variants or combinations of these - jealousy, glee, guilt, vindication, pride, embarrassment, all of those."

Antoine did his best to think his way through this. "So this other student was to be starting out able to feel anger and fear but was taught she must not," he said. He began to feel something familiar in his brain, as if he was on the path to learning something big. If people developed different ways of feeling, then... "Seahorse, is this where personalities are coming from?"

She looked at him, pleased. "Why yes! We adapt to our families and then use those same adaptations for the rest of our lives with the other people we meet. And that, as you've just realised, is what a personality is."

"Is this why, ah, let us say, Sonic and Rotor are so different?" He asked, following up on his hunch.

"What do you think?" she answered.

He held his breath as he thought. "Sonic is happy a lot of the time." He widened his eyes and looked at Seahorse. Something serious had just occurred to him. "Do you think he feels he can only be happy?"

The seahorse offered him an indulgent smile. "Do you think so?"

_Always passing it back to me,_ Antoine thought with a flash of irritation which he chose to ignore. "Maybe this is so. But these other emotions, I have seen him showing them also. But Madame, how can we be knowing when it is right to show an emotion and when it is not? It is not always so right for him to be happy because sometimes he is happy when he is teasing me. This is not right, is it?"

Seahorse shook her head. "I don't think it is. But perhaps I can show you something else that will help answer your question. Let's take sadness as an example. Sadness is only appropriate when we know something is already lost. Usually this means it is appropriate to feel sad about bad events in the past because there's nothing we can do to change them. How does Sonic react to past losses?"

This made Antoine wonder. "Usually he does not to be concentrating on the past. Most of us miss Mobotropolis but I do not think I have heard him ever speaking of how he feels about losing it."

"So it sounds like he might feel a block to feeling sadness," she said. After a pause in which Antoine considered this (when you grew up in a war zone, what did it mean to be unable or unwilling to feel sad? Did it give new meaning to Sonic's lack of ever mentioning the deceased Cat, for instance?) the pipefish spoke again. "How about fear? How does he relate to dangerous events yet to come?"

Sonic had a reputation for being fearless. Antoine had always felt resentful about that so it presented a problem to think objectively about Sonic's fear. The coyote tried anyway. "He does his best to always be looking confident when there is danger," he said slowly, feeling the way carefully through this unfamiliar train of thought. "He is the good at it." This next step in his thinking came as a surprise. He sat there with the feeling - or lack of feeling. For once in his life he had taken notice of Sonic's fearlessness without feeling afraid or bitter or wounded, and he noticed that that felt lighter because of it. Much lighter. "I have seen him looking scared or making the sarcastic of comments about something when he is afraid. He does not to be liking others to see this. I do not think he knows that I have seen." And he didn't feel proud when he said this.

Or not very much, at any rate.

"So it means a lot to him to be seen as fearless. It sounds like a big part of his self-image," said Seahorse.

"Yes Madame, I believe this is true."

"What do you notice when he _does_ get scared? How does he manage the feeling - apart from hiding it from the rest of the group?"

It simply hadn't occurred to Antoine to think this way about it. So he did now, and felt delighted with the chance to do so because it felt so fresh and light and new to talk about it without feeling angry or contemptuous.

"He seems to be annoyed," Antoine said, eyes defocused as he watched a memory. "Like he wishes this danger was not there, that it would go away. I am thinking that some of the time he is angry at himself for getting into this bad place."

"That's how it looks to you?" asked the counsellor.

"Oui Madame."

She hummed. "How about anger?"

"Well, he is certainly angry at Robotnik," Antoine answered at once. And then he thought further about this. "But only some of the time. Mostly he is in this strange joy place - ah, racket as you say - that does not seem to be fitting and he mocks Robotnik." This spawned an idea. "In fact... It is the way he is with me."

"Can you tell me more about that?" The seahorse sounded very interested in his line of thought.

Antoine looked at her. The way seemed open to talk and think about this more but he was surprised to come to this realisation at all. He spoke on, listening to himself as he spoke. The words, as they came, were as much a surprise to him as they must have been to Seahorse.

"He is either joyful - strange, out of the place joyful - or angry at me. When he is joyful he mocks me, when he is angry it is because I fail in a mission and-" he gulped before he went on. He hated to say the next thing but the insights he was gaining were too valuable to give up now. He steeled himself against the pain of admitting his failures and pressed on. "-and he gets angry if I make the group be in danger." He noticed Seahorse's look of confusion and clarified. "Like the time we were rescuing Cat and I fell out of the grating."

She nodded her understanding. "And how is that similar to his reaction to Robotnik?" She asked quietly.

"He is angry at Robotnik when he is threatened - really threatened. When Robotnik makes him feel in danger or when he is putting my princess in danger. And he mocks Robotnik when he wants to make Robotnik look small, or himself look better or stronger, I think."

Seahorse nodded. "So he does the same with you."

"Oui," said Antoine and fell silent. Sonic treated him essentially as an enemy? What a thought! The coyote closed his eyes and concentrated. "Let me think of this." Then he decided what he wanted to do next, opened his eyes and looked at the A-board. "It is acceptable for me to be writing on there, yes?" When Seahorse nodded he stood up and took the graphite. "Sonic will be allowing me to see his racket-joy and his real joy," he said and put an R next to the word Joy. He put a tick on the other side ( which for him signified authentic feelings). "He does not letting me to see his real sadness or racket-sadness." He was just about to put a cross beside Sadness when Seahorse spoke.

"Except the time he was separated from his uncle."

Antoine looked at her. "Oh. Yes, I was forgetting this." He looked at the board and wondered how to note down sometimes-rackets.

"But perhaps that was an unusually intense time. You have the most understanding of whether Sonic usually lets you see him sad."

That cleared things up for Antoine, and he put and R and a small tick by that one too. He looked at the word anger and, after a moment's thought, put a large R and a big tick by it. He narrowed his eyes at Fear and left it blank.

Seahorse peered at his work and then nodded. "He really seems to have his favourite emotions."

Antoine nodded.

Seahorse smiled at him but said nothing, and then glanced up at the clock. "That's the end of today's session. I'll see you next week."

She showed him to the door, but before stepping outside he spoke to her. "What is it I should be doing this week? I am thinking I should watch Sonic and see if these racket emotions are true."

"I think you've already seen that they are. But watch him any way - you might notice new things about his relationship with his feelings. See you next week."

_Just a reminder that I am accepting story commissions. I charge $8 for 1,000 words and offer a discount for 5,000 words ($35, which gives a discount of $5) and 10,000 words ($70, which gives a discount of $10)._

_The more commissions I get, the sooner I will be able to stop taking commissions and carry on with this story. Alternatively, if anyone wants me to write more of this for money, I'd be very much obliged! I take payment by Paypal and will give you my Paypal address if you PM me._

TO BE CONTINUED...

DISCLAIMER: "Sonic the Hedgehog" and most other characters and situations in the following story are copyrighted trademarks of Sega Incorporated, Archie Comics and/or DIC Productions. Permission to reproduce this specific material may be granted by the author so long as you email first. Words and Seahorse character © 2013 Velvet D'Coolette/Hayley Deakin.


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